Hidden Away
by Sacred Jedi
Summary: Cursed so that Athena can never sense her, Annabeth is constantly attacked by monsters. At age three she was found in an alleyway by Sally Jackson and grew up as Percy's 'twin' sister. When the lighting bolt is stolen Athena slowly begins to realize that the demi-god helping Jackson is actually her own daughter.
1. Prologue

**Hidden Away**

**Disclaimer: I own nothing, all credit goes to the owner/creator of Percy Jackson. **

**Summary: Cursed so that Athena can never sense her, Annabeth is constantly attacked by monsters. At age three she was found in an alleyway by Sally Jackson and grew up as Percy's 'twin' sister. When the lighting bolt is stolen Athena slowly begins to ****realize**** that the demi-god helping Jackson is actually her own daughter. **

_**Prologue**_

It was all Ares' fault. That was all that the council on Olympus agreed upon. Someone had stolen Apollo's chariot for seven days and that meant a seven day eclipse for the mortal world. He may have been fun and laid back but the sun god liked his chariot and after the sixth day he was pretty mad. Ares blamed it on Athena using a framing technique so Apollo cursed her with all the power he had. Not only could she not have any more children but her youngest child who had just been born would not be able to be watched over, seen, or sensed by Athena. It started out as something that Zeus cared very little about until he realized that _none_ of the gods, not even Apollo, could sense the presence of the child as a demi-god anymore.

He looked into the problem and revealed Ares to be the one who had stolen the chariot so that Apollo could lift the curse. Unfortunately, it was too late for them. It took three years of long debates before Zeus finally agreed that if Athena had missed three years of her daughters life then she should be allowed to get three more back. This meant that Annabeth could actually _stay_ with the goddess in her home and no-one could blame anyone but Ares for this. When Apollo came down to the mortal world with Athena to lift the curse they found that Dr. Chase had lost Annabeth.

_Lost_ her.

Naturally, the goddess was furious and demanded to know everything. All that Dr. Chase and his new wife knew was that they had left for a holiday for one week whilst leaving Annabeth in the care of a nanny who turned out to be much worse than she appeared and when they came back she was gone. The window in her bedroom was open and the nanny had drunk so much alcohol that she died in hospital a few days later. They filed a missing persons report until the issue of photographs came up and it seemed that the drunk nanny had destroyed every last one of them in her drunken state. Athena was more enraged than before and left the home after cursing Dr. Chase in many different languages and swearing that he would never see Annabeth again once she was found.

However, Athena was never going to find Annabeth since the three year old had already gotten herself into quite a mess.

After running away from home out of fear, Annabeth had used money she stole to get a train ride to New York and was attacked by many different types of monsters on the way. As you can imagine, a three year old didn't stand much of a chance and by the time of her second day after running away she was sitting in an alleyway bleeding profoundly. Without the blessing of any of the gods to help her it seemed that Annabeth was dead but this time it was sheer luck that saved her when Sally Jackson walked past and heard the crying of a little girl who was dreanched in her own blood.

Little Percy Jackson was with her at the time as they were walking home from his pre-school and he just watched in confusion as his mother calmed down the sobbing girl who was ranting about monsters that came after her because of how she smelt. Not being stupid, Sally knew at once that Annabeth was a demi-god. There was no doubt about it to her. She cleaned the child up as best she could in the alleyway and carried her back to the apartment she shared with Percy and his soon to be step-father. Ever the responsible person, Sally contacted the police to let them know about Annabeth but the girl refused to give her last name and a DNA test proved nothing at all.

After one week of staying with the Jackson's and waiting for someone to come and get her, the police gave up and said that Annabeth would be able to remain with Sally if she filled out the correct paperwork. Sally was a kind and generous person so she could hardly bring herself to send scared little Annabeth away and soon it became known to anyone who visited that Percy had a twin sister who had been very ill when she was born and had only just been allowed to return home. Gabe, the soon to be step-father, was very unsure about marrying Sally when he found out but when he found out that Annabeth's intelligence could lead to him winning every card game he played he was all for it.

So, Annabeth became Annabeth Jackson and the most intelligent person at every school she went to. The pre-school were too shocked to do anything but constantly praise Sally Jackson on raising such an intelligent child and as Annabeth grew up her grades remained at top level. As the years passed, Annabeth and Percy soon forgot about how they weren't fully related and completely believed that they were twins. When it got to the age where doctors did check-ups people were shocked to learn that Annabeth and Percy had dyslexia and ADHD. They could hardly believe that Annabeth had it whilst they had always suspected it with Percy. It was a strange time for them all.

As Annabeth and Percy turned twelve years old their futures soon became distorted by creatures that would hurt them and try to kill them. The lightning bolt had just been stolen and Zeus confronted Poseidon whilst threatening to harm Percy should the bolt not be returned. Poseidon believed that Sally had just adopted a child Percy's age to make him feel better since he did not have a father around to care for him and, due to Apollo's curse, could not sense that Annabeth was really the child of Athena. If he had, then the god might not have been so keen to have a child of his rival living under his blessing. The entire Jackson family recieved Poseidon's blessing and so Annabeth received it too. Nobody ever suspected a thing about the two children until one day in their middle school...

* * *

Love it? Hate it? Let me know if I should continue with this.


	2. We Vaporise A Maths Teacher

**Hidden Away**

**Disclaimer: I own nothing, all credit goes to the owner/creator of Percy Jackson. **

**Summary: Cursed so that Athena can never sense her, Annabeth is constantly attacked by monsters. At age three she was found in an alleyway by Sally Jackson and grew up as Percy's 'twin' sister. When the lighting bolt is stolen Athena slowly begins to ****realize**** that the demi-god helping Jackson is actually her own daughter.**

_**We Vaporise A Maths Teacher, Annabeth Jackson (Chase)**_

I never asked to be a half-blood. My life wasn't perfect before all this happened, it still isn't, but I'm pretty sure that I wasn't in constant life threatening danger and all that. Take my advice, if you think you might be just like me and Percy then you'd better stop reading right here and leave because I don't think things are going to get better for you from here on in. I've never met someone who actually got _better_ when their life was in constant danger and I doubt I'll see one for a long while.

My name is Annabeth Jackson, I'm twelve years old and a month or so ago I was just the smartest kid in Yancy Academy. That's a private school for troubled kids in upstate New York. Now, I know what you're thinking. How could the smartest kid in the school be troubled? Well, you can take a look at any point in my life and figure out why. It may have something to do with the fact that my brother is an airhead who doesn't apply himself to anything, other than getting his butt kicked by me, or it could have something to do with the fact that our lives have been hell from the very beginning.

Now, things started to go really bad when our sixth grade class decided upon a field trip to Manhattan. We're talking twenty-eight mentally challenged kids with only two teachers on a bright yellow bus that some kids have run into because they thought, and I quote, 'it was a magical ray of sunshine'. And they say me and Percy are the worst... _please_. We were heading to the Metropolitan Museum of Art to study for our history class and that meant looking at lots of ancient Greek and Roman artifacts. Percy thought it was hell, as he explained several times, but I thought it would be great. I'm not the smartest kid in the school because I hate learning. Duh.

Almost every one of our Yancy field trips have been hell for us, though. Even my optimistic mood on some occasions just got me and Percy into more trouble because they thought we'd actually _enjoyed_ making these trips hell. Well, this trip was being led by a middle aged guy called Mr Brunner in a motorized wheelchair. He's our Latin teacher and won't stop giving me advice on what to read in my spare time so he was definitely on my good side on day one. Percy liked him because his classes were the only ones he didn't have to sleep through and because Mr. Brunner let us play games in class whenever we got bored. You can probably tell that my brother has a brain made of salt water.

Mr. Brunner has thin brown hair, an untidy beard that isn't half as bad as the ones in other classes and this nice jacket which Percy swears has the permanent smell of coffee on it even though I think of it more as a tea scent. Oh well, my brother _knows_ his coffee so I'll just have to take his word for that. Mr. Brunner is the only teacher who my and Percy both spend time with. I go because of the large range of Roman armor and weapons that he has whilst Percy goes either to copy my homework or to play a wicked game on Mr. Brunner's computer against the ma. I'm not going to lie. Percy got his butt kicked half the time he played and it wasn't even by me.

Anyway, this trip seemed like it was going to be the first okay one of the year.

Well... I _hoped_ it would be. You can't imagine how much I kicked myself for being wrong afterwards, and I am _never_ wrong. Let's set the record straight, me and Percy have this problem where trouble follows us wherever we go. In pre-school we managed to get everything nailed to the ceiling, which is totally impossible for three year olds to do but we got expelled anyway. Percy had this really weird incident in fifth-grade with a Revolutionary war cannon that got us _both_ expelled because apparently I was standing with him even though I spent all of my time by the lost ships exhibit. If you're half as smart as I am, you'll get the picture by now.

So, I had to give myself the mission of making sure Percy didn't get us _both_ expelled for the fourth time in a row because my dream of being an architect is just going to drift further and further away if we keep going through schools this fast. Throughout the bus ride, Percy had to put up with this really ugly red-headed girl named Nancy Bobofit. She would have been after me still if I hadn't scared her off by using my credits as the smartest girl in the school to sneak a pillow full of ketchup and mustard into her room with a note saying 'you come near me again and the colour of your face will be the colour of your clothes'. That girl must love her clothes because I didn't hear anything bad from her again. In fact, I'd say she has a new found respect for me.

This time, however, it wasn't Percy she was hitting with those disgusting peanut-butter and ketchup sandwiches of hers. No. She was busy hitting our friend Grover who leeches off my homework just as much as Percy does. I never had the heart to beat him up like I do with Percy when I get annoyed because Grover is _super_ sensitive. He's the only target easier than this weird kid in second grade who thinks all insults are rainbows. Don't ask. Anyway, Grover was a scrawny kid who cried when he couldn't do something and had been held back several grades. To top it all off, he was crippled. Being the good person that I am, my brothers opinions aside, I read up on those who had problems walking and tried to figure out a way to help him. I was fairly certain that by the end of seventh grade I'd be able to perform the surgery myself.

Now, don't let this act fool you. Grover may walk like it pains him to exist and have a note excusing him from every PE lesson for the rest of his existence but you should have seen him when they held up a notice for a flower eating contest. To this day I am certain that the man has a plant eating problem and his permanent title in the school records book for 'flower lover' didn't do him any favors. Although, for once in his life, Grover didn't seem to care about that. I've been trying to enforce that kind of attitude into his mind ever since I met the guy so I was positive that there had been a breakthrough.

I would have threatened Nancy to leave Grover alone and to pick on someone who could kick her ass any day of the week had Percy not gone and gotten us into trouble _again_. I'm being serious, I left him alone for _one minute_ and suddenly we're both on probation and being threatened with an in-school suspension that will surely be the death of both of us. So, that ruled out any threats, fighting, arguing and trouble making on this trip which is a shame because I was really looking forward to humiliating Percy again on this trip.

"I'm going to kill her," Percy said quietly enough to avoid being heard by the bats of a teacher that was assisting Mr. Brunner.

Grover, gods help him, tried to calm him down with this. "It's okay. I rather like peanut butter."

Well, I could see that was going to fail right off the bat. "Try something else Grover," I whispered to him helpfully and he gave me a look of thanks after seeing how Percy looked after he had said that.

Right afterwards, he was forced to veer left to avoid another missile of Nancy's disgusting lunch choice. Even I was starting to get angry now and when I am about to get suspended I can keep my temper in check for long periods of time. But this was just insane. Percy seemed to be thinking more practically as he started to get up with a quick "That's it".

Me and Grover had to pull him back down even though I was having thoughts about going after the cow myself.

"You two are already on probation," Grover reminded him. "Think of who'll get blamed if anything bad happens."

"Yeah," I agree. "And think of who'll have a broken nose if he gets me thrown out of school again."

Percy shot me a withering look which I returned with one ten times better. We'd grown up like this with the whole sibling rivalry thing and I'll bet that if we hadn't had that we would have been really nice to each other but it wasn't happening. Brothers and sisters were meant to fight and there was no better example of this than me and Percy. Although, the fights usually consisted of a scuffle that ended with me on top apart from that one time when we fell into a swimming pool and Percy nearly beat me. I dread to think what might have happened had I not chosen that moment to hit him where it hurts.

Now that I think about it, I'm fairly certain that getting suspended from that school wouldn't have been such a bad idea. Nancy Bobofit certainly had it coming, just like the pillow incident, but another reason was that it most likely would have gotten us out of the horrors at the museum. Let me just say this for the record: it was entirely Percy's fault.

Mr. Brunner was the one leading the tour, to mine and Percy's relief, and he led us around talking about lots of interesting things. There were spears, swords and shields which he just wouldn't stop talking about and things that he would describe in Latin just for me. Everyone had gotten used to this by now as it just gave them another excuse to talk to one another. I guess that's why I never got mobbed in the corridors for being a know-it-all. Even Percy seemed to be enjoying this trip whilst everyone else was bored out of their minds which, I must say, is something I never thought I'd see outside of the dormitories.

We came to a stop beside this Roman _stele_ which was a grave mark for a girl around our age. It was worth about two of me and Percy put together since we're the same size this year. Mr. Brunner had some really interesting things to say about it but I had to repeat everything to Percy since everyone around us was talking and he couldn't tell them to shut up because of Mrs. Dodds, our maths teacher. She had Percy pinned on her no. 1 enemy list whilst I held the spot and number two. I was actually clean for a while until I invented a joke for Percy to make him feel better after Mrs. Dodds graded one of his papers and gave me a hundred percent, as usual. Ever since she's been trying to find excuses to put me down by a mark but my work was air tight.

Mrs. Dodds was fifty years old, something I figured out whilst doing a background check that Mr. Brunner suggested when he overheard me telling Percy that she wasn't worth his anger. In my opinion, _I_ am the only one worthy of my twins anger because I am the one who beats him senseless when he makes me mad and then gives him advice when he's troubled. It's just the typical brother and sister relationship that never dies, I guess. It took all of five seconds for Mrs. Dodds to favor Nancy Bobofit above all others and that riled up me and Percy real quick. First of all, I am the favourite of every teacher in the school because I am the one who acts the most normal. Second, she had to be mental herself to fall in love with a pug like Nancy.

Even though I hated her, the maths lessons were always amusing for me. Want to know why? It was because Mrs. Dodds would do this real dramatic thing by pointing on finger at Percy and saying in the sweetest voice she could muster, "Now sweetie," and before you knew it we were out in the corridor with Percy swearing under his breath for being given yet another month of detention. I was with Grover when Percy came in at midnight one day and said in a clear voice, "That hags not human." It was like a miracle when Grover stopped crying over what some troll from eight grade had said to him and agreed that he was absolutely right. We've been using that road to stop his crying for weeks now and I must say it's going really well.

I knew Percy's temper was about to snap when Nancy snickered in that goblin like way about the naked guy on the _stele_ so I turned around at the same time he did and we both said at the same time.

"Will you _shut up_?"

Every kid in the group started laughing because we'd said it at the same time and Percy went beetroot red because of it. Mr. Brunner stopped talking to see what was going on and I guess he found the idea of giving Percy and me something else to focus on a good one.

"Jacksons," He said. "Is there something wrong?"

I was fully intent on stating that Nancy was being her usual self, witnesses be damned, but Percy could never do anything like that in front of Mr. Brunner.

"No, sir." He replied.

"Annabeth?" Mr. Brunner asked expectantly.

I gave Percy an exasperated look and repeated what he'd said a moment ago. "No, sir."

Then, Mr. Brunner pointed to one of the images on the _stele_. "Percy, can you tell me what this picture represents?"

Percy looked at the image Mr. Brunner was talking about and I could literally see his brain click with recognition. I hoped it would too because I had spent a whole Saturday drilling those things into that thick skull of his. "That's Kronos eating his kids, right?"

Mr. Brunner was probably hoping for an answer like I would have given because he didn't seem too impressed. "Yes, and he did this because...?"

I could see Percy struggling and elbowed him in the side where no-one could see me do it. That seemed to give him the spark he needed.

"Kronos was the king god, and -"

I elbowed him harder.

"Titan," He corrected himself. I could see Mr. Brunner smile at me out of the corner of my eye. "He didn't trust his kids, the gods, because he thought they would be too powerful for him so he ate them all. But his wife hid baby Zeus and when he grew up he tricked Kronos into barfing up the other gods-"

"Yuck!" said one of the girls behind us.

"- and then there was this massive fight between the gods and the titans and the titans won." Percy finished.

I was actually proud of him. It only took me two elbows to get him to remember all of that and usually it would take me stepping on his foot or giving him a hard punch in the gut to finally get him to cough it up. Maybe going on field trips that you enjoy really does have a good effect on people. Even Percy. I'll bet it didn't help him when the other kids snicked at him, though. Some people behind me saw me elbow him in the side and I felt like barfing myself when I saw Nancy, of all people, give me an approving look. I returned it with a rude hand gesture and her face went as red as the ugly hair on her head. Instead, she muttered to her friend. "Why do we need to know this rubbish anyway? It's not like our employers are going to ask, 'Why did Kronos eat his kids'?"

"But why Mr. Jackson, to rephrase Mr. Bobofit's questions, does this matter in real life?"

Percy looked at me the second after the question was said and it was pretty obvious that he didn't have a clue what was going on. Mr. Brunner saw this too and so he asked me instead. That's another of the reasons why I always liked him as a teacher.

"Because any and all knowledge can help you in life and in life threatening situations this is the stuff that can make the difference between life and death. Or, if you are looking for work, a good job or a bad job," I answered smartly and Percy sent the smuggest look of his life back to Nancy. She must hate me almost as much as she hates Percy by now.

Mr. Brunner smiled and nodded. "Good answer, Annabeth. Well, half-credit to Percy since I did not fail to miss the way your sister helped you out there. Yes, Zeus did indeed feed Zeus a mixture of mustard and wine to make him disgorge his other give childen. All of whom, being immortal gods, had been living and growing up undigested in their fathers stomach. The gods defeated their father, sliced him into thousands of pieces with his own scythe and scattered his remains into Tartarus, the darkest part of the underworld. With that happy memo, it's time for lunch. Mrs. Dodds, could you please lead us back outside?"

We were half way to the door, dodging the boys who were shoving each other about like the dimwits they were, when Mr. Brunner stopped us. "Mr. Jackson!" He called, making Percy stop and I couldn't exactly go on because of the grip he had on my sleeve. He probably thought there was a question that he needed me to answer for him. I kept my gaze away since it was obviously a conversation between him and Mr. Brunner that I was not going to be able to get away from.

"You must learn the answer to the question," Mr. Brunner said in all seriousness and I could feel his intense gaze on Percy even when I was looking elsewhere.

"About the titans?" I could have killed him right then for being such an idiot.

"About real life. Learn the answer from your sister by heart if you have to but remember that what you learn from me is vitally important. I will expect you to treat it as such. Only the best is expected from you, Percy Jackson."

I'm fairly certain by the way that Percy had my sleeve in a death grip that he wasn't able to get angry about it since when he does he just lets go and turns to face the person who made him angry fully. I always found that to be the stupidest thing in the world since that just exposes all of your body to your opponent and will get more harm caused to you than if you were facing them sideways. Not to mention, you'd be able to hold your own if they slammed into you and kept enough force in your legs. This is why I always beat him in fights. Percy seriously needs to learn how to learn the important things in life. The first of which being common sense.

Percy muttered something about 'trying harder in the future', which I didn't believe for a second, whilst Mr. Brunner handed me a book about the gods and their histories before looking at the _stele_ with a saddened look on his face. Anyone would have thought that he'd been to her funeral himself but I have said this one and I will say it again. I am not the smartest kid in the school for nothing. Grover was waiting for us when we left Mr. Brunner after he'd told us to go for lunch. When Percy had been called back and stopped me with him he'd told Grover to move on in that silent language of theirs. I was about three steps from cracking it at this point in time.

Lunch was being 'served' on the front steps of the museum. It wasn't a pretty sight for any mature person. We walked past several wrestling matches, a 'blind' Mrs. Dodds who still managed to glare at Percy and me and Nancy Bobofit who was trying to pickpocket something from a poor, unsuspecting older woman. I put a stop to that in a heartbeat by doing something I've always wanted to do. I decked Nancy Bobofit. Mrs. Dodds was actually looking the other way for once and one threatening look was all it took for Nancy to keep that large trap of hers shut. Percy and Grover gave me hi-fives as we went to sit on the edge of the fountain, far away from all of the commotion.

I wasn't sure if anyone else but Percy noticed, but there was a nasty storm cloud spreading through the sky a few miles away. The press put the whole thing down to global warming when they couldn't ignore it after a major flooding that claimed about fifty peoples lives. There was this thing I always had inside of me that I could never force down and it was that the lightning somehow seemed familiar. Percy didn't like it much but I put that down to me tormenting him when we were younger about his fears. I kept having these strange dreams where my own voice would be saying to me 'lets follow the lightning and see what's on the other side'. I thought I was going insane or something for a while.

"Detentions?" Grover asked, looking at each of us in turn. Even I was no stranger to detentions but for once Percy had not gotten me into trouble with him.

"Nah," Percy said. "Not from Brunner, at least, though Mrs. Dodds has been giving me the evil eye lately. I just wish that he could lay off me. I'm not a genius like Annabeth - I think he expects me to be just because she's my twin."

It could have been my imagination, but I was sure that I saw Grover flinch at the word 'twin'. He glanced at the sky as though he was thinking that lightning from the storm a few miles away was going to come and strike us all down. I passed it off as Grover's fear of everything. How wrong I was to ignore something that my intelligent brain was screaming at me to notice. That's what you get from a bad influence like Percy.

Out of the blue, Grover said, "Can I have your apples?"

Me and Percy gave him the ones that we had in our lunches since neither of us were that keen on fruit or vegetables. A healthy living was advised and what my mind said was the best thing to do but an unhealthy diet with a healthy lifestyle of exercise was enough of a balance for me. It all worked out perfectly and I shoved all those little voices to the little blank space at the back of my head. Percy had said many times that it didn't exist but those thoughts had to go somewhere.

I noticed that Percy was spending a lot of time watching the cabs drive by Fifth Avenue and I knew exactly why. That's where our mom's apartment is and neither of us have seen her since Christmas. Percy wants to go there to see her and to get away from all of the things around here but I want to go there to protect her from that step-father of ours named Gabe. He smells bad enough to take down a fully grown bull elephant and his gambling games often call for my assistance since I know whether someone is bluffing or not. I've learned to just decline and threaten never to help him again to get him off my back for the day when his friends are over.

Percy was in the process of unwrapping his sandwich when Nancy Bobofit appeared like a hag in a rainstorm in front of us with her group of worshipers behind her. I guess the decking incident put her in the mood to annoy my brother since she couldn't get back at me. My temper flares so quickly it's a second faster than Percy's. It's because my intelligence mixes in with the anger and tells me to do something as fast as possible, so I do. She dumped her half eaten lunch right in Grover's lap and I was ready to murder her. I could be my own lawyer if the worst came to the worst.

"Oops." She grinned a disgusting smile at Percy and it is safe to say that my brother lost it right then and there.

The school counsellor had been to see us a million times this year but it never stuck and so was the case this time. However, nothing could have prepared me for what happened next. I was facing the other way at the time but I definitely heard the sound of rushing water and the next thing I knew Nancy was sitting in the water fountain behind where we were sitting. Not one of us three had moved an inch.

"Percy pushed me!" Nancy screeched from behind us and like a bat to it's offspring Mrs. Dodds materialized out of nowhere.

The maths teacher went to check on Nancy whilst me and Percy had stood up from the fountain wall and gave each other confused looks. The other kids around us where whispering things that made no sense.

"Did you see -"

"- the water from the fountain -"

"- went right over them -"

I had no idea what they were on about and Percy obviously had no idea either. From 'them' I knew they meant me and Percy since Grover never got involved in things like this and Mr. Brunner was looking from Percy to me like he'd just seen a ghost. What had we done that was so amazing and fearful? So, anyway, Mrs. Dodds made sure Nancy was alright before rounding on the two of us. She looked like she'd just got the shock of her life and I couldn't understand it. Believe me, I never like not understanding something no matter what it is. Behind her shocked stare was also a look of triumph. Had she been waiting for Nancy to fall in the water fountain _all_ semester?

"No, sweeties," _Sweeties_. She never said that. It was always 'sweetie' this and 'sweetie' that when referring to Percy but this time she was referring to the two of us. In case she hadn't noticed, Nancy said that _Percy_ pushed her in the pool and not me.

Grover looked ready to wet himself.

"I know, I know," Percy said. "A months detention each." He said it so casually that I couldn't resist the urge to glare at him. Since when did he not think that us both getting into trouble from Mrs. Dodds was normal?

Turns out, like so many other things Percy has done, that was not the best thing to say in this situation.

"Come with me. The pair of you."

"Wait!" Grover shouted just as we turned to leave. I was amazed and so was Percy. The man had never shouted before in his life and here he was doing it right now. "It was me. I was the one who pushed her, not them." Now I was shocked beyond my dreams. This was something you didn't see every day. What was strange was that Mrs. Dodds scared Grover to death. He couldn't even talk to her straight.

Our maths teacher glared at him down her crooked nose. "I don't think so, Mr. Underwood." She said in a clear and stern voice before looking back at us. "_Now_, my dears."

My dears? I've never heard her say that before. Grover looked ready to protest but Mr. Brunner stopped him. I didn't seen him move closer or notice that he was beside us until right now. I would have considered the idea that my blonde hair had hidden him from view if it wasn't all tied up in a pony tail for today's field trip. Percy was busy giving Nancy a death stare so I looked up the museum steps and was surprised to see Mrs. Dodds already standing up there. What the hell? How did she move that fast? Last I checked, a fifty year old could not move that fast. She gestured impatiently for us to come along.

I elbowed Percy in the side and the moment he saw Mrs. Dodds his eyes went wide. He must have noticed how fast she moved too. We started climbing the steps one by one together.

"How did she get way up there in a few seconds?" Percy asked in shock.

I shook my head at him. "For once, I don't know. Maybe she's been doing a workout or something in her spare time?"

"No workout could make a fifty year old move like_ that._"

As much as I didn't want to, I had to agree with Percy on that one. Something just wasn't right about this and we both could feel it. We both looked back at Grover and found him waving sadly at us with an apologetic look on his face and Mr. Brunner had once again become engrossed in his novel like nothing had happened. I was beginning to think I'd imagined the shock part I saw in their eyes. Once that was done, we continued after Mrs. Dodds who had moved once again. She was headed inside the museum now.

This was probably the part where she made Percy but Nancy something from the gift shop and made me buy something for her aswell which was totally unfair since I didn't actually do anything. By the time we caught sight of Mrs. Dodds again, she was headed inside the gallery and we followed. I had thought that there would be many people observing the gallery at this time of day but there was nobody else in there aside from us. My brain said something was out of the ordinary right away but I shook it off. I was focusing on staying still when mine and Percy's ADHD meant that we couldn't stay still for long periods of time.

Mrs. Dodds stood with her arms crossed over her chest in front of a frieze of the greek gods. I was more interested in looking at it than at her.

"Now, dears," She said, giving the frieze a strangely hateful look. "You've been giving us troubles."

"Yes, ma'am." Percy replied stupidly. Didn't he even want to know why she had said we were giving her and someone else troubles? Or why a maths teacher wanted to destroy a frieze of the greek gods?

Something inside of me jerked when she started to take off her cuff-lings. "You didn't really think you could get away with it, did you?"

She had this evil look in her eyes and I decided to step in before Percy could cause any more damage. "Get away with what?" I asked with slightly narrowed eyes. No teacher should have a look like _that_ in their eyes.

The entire building shook. "We are not fools, Jacksons." She said. "It was only a small matter of time before we found you out. And now, we have. Confess and you will both suffer through less pain."

Now I was starting to get cautious. Percy was giving me a look that said he was getting wary too. I was hoping that she had figured out how many times I'd fought with people just because they were calling me names for one time in their lives but that seemed unlikely. Those people tended to move away with an excuse of the school being too disrupted for their learning. That was partially correct.

"Well?" She demanded. "Either of you?"

"Miss, I'm afraid we don't..." I am cut off.

"Your time is up!"

That's when my nightmare really began. Her body began changing into something entirely new. Her back snapped and cracked as it was changed and her fingers turned into large talons whilst wings flew out of her back like knifes cutting through butter. Her eyes were like the black holes you read about in books and the jacket she was wearing sizzled like it was on a frying pan then merged with the wings to make them all leathery. In the end, there was only one thing my mind registered. Mrs. Dodds was not a human being and she sure as hell wasn't a nice monster to be with.

Everything happened so fast after that. Her yellow stained fangs were barred at us in a threatening manner and we started backing away when Mr. Brunner, who would have had a hell of a time getting up those steps this quick in a wheelchair, appeared in the doorway.

"Percy! Annabeth!" He threw an object to each of us as he shouted our names. To Percy he threw a ballpoint pen and to me he threw a bronze knife that didn't look like it had been made for chopping up cooking ingredients and was always on Mr. Brunner's belt when he was doing a demonstration in class. We caught them both our of reflex and the ballpoint pen changed into an intimidating sword the moment it hit Percy's hand. Once again that day, we shared a look of shock.

We were forced to dive out of the way when Mrs. Dodds flew right at us and her talons almost slashed us to pieces as we rolled on the floor. Me and Percy stared at her wide eyed from our crouched positions even as we started to move. She came back around for another attack but I am fairly certain that she didn't expect me to duck under her talons and slash her belly open in just under two seconds flat. Percy slammed his sword into her body and she fell from the sky and just like that our maths teacher turned into a pile of dust on the marble floor.

Me and Percy were frozen to the spot. I thought she had turned into a pile of dust on the floor when actually the dust had just disappeared. We were both stood in silence for a long time before I noticed two things. One was that the ballpoint pen was now a ballpoint pen again and the second was that the knife that had been in my hand was gone. In it's place was a card that said 'have a nice day!' on it and was from the museum gift shop. I'd seen it in the window as we walked in and thought nothing of fit back then. I am the first one to break the silence.

"What the heck just happened?" I asked, not believing my own eyes.

Percy slowly shook his head, his mouth hanging open. "I... I don't know. It must have been our ADHD. Right? Things like that don't just happen."

I nod my head once, slowly. "Yeah... yeah, that must be it. In some extreme cases people have been known to hallucinate."

"Do people hallucinate about the same thing?" Percy asked nervously.

"Sometimes," I reply quietly. "Let's just... go back outside."

So we did. Anything to get out of the gallery where we'd just had what we thought at the time was a hallucination caused by our ADHD. Mr. Brunner hadn't been in the doorway when we'd looked and he was back outside reading his book once we got there. Grover was sitting by the fountain again, looking at a piece of paper he'd retrieved from his pocket whilst using a map to shield his head from the rain. It seemed that whilst we'd been inside the storm had spread to the museum and the surrounding areas. Nancy was standing in a puddle looking like a drowned poodle whilst muttering to her 'worshipers'.

When she spotted us she seemed happier than before. "I hope Mrs Kerr gave it to you good!" She said.

Percy blinked and I frowned. What? Ever the blunt twin brother, Percy point blank asked Nancy what on earth she was talking about but Nancy just called him a weirdo and went back to her friends. We looked at each other with identical frowns on our faces and then walked over to Grover to ask him the exact same thing. Everyone knew that he could not lie to safe his life. However, when we did, he just replied that she was a teacher we had. I asked where Mrs. Dodds had gone.

"Dodds?" He asked with a frown of his own. "We don't have a teacher named Mrs. Dodds, Annabeth. Our maths teacher is Mrs Kerr."

My temper snapped like that. "This isn't funny, Grover. We're being serious." I said but Grover just gave me that fearful and confused look he always had on when I lost my temper.

Percy spotted Mr. Brunner in his wheelchair sitting under that umbrella he had and we both walked over to him. By now we were both utterly speechless from confusion.

"Ah, my pen, Mr. Jackson. In future, do remember to ask your sister for a writing utensil and not me. Oh, and the card I picked up from the gift shop." He said.

Wordlessly, he took the card from my hand and Percy handed his over like a mute moron.

"Sir," Percy began uncertainly. "Where did Mrs. Dodds go?"

"Who?" He seemed to think this was some kind of joke or that we had gotten the names of two people mixed up.

"Mrs. Dodds," I said for Percy. "The maths teacher. You know, the one who was assisting you on this field trip. Where is she?"

Mr. Brunner gave me a concerned look. "Annabeth, there was no Mrs. Dodds on this trip nor has there ever been one at Yancy Academy. Are you two feeling alright?"

Me and Percy shared a look for the hundredth time. No. We weren't feeling alright at all. We were never going to be feeling alright again.


	3. Leaving Yancy Academy

**Hidden Away**

**Disclaimer: I own nothing, all credit goes to the owner/creator of Percy Jackson. **

**Summary: Cursed so that Athena can never sense her, Annabeth is constantly attacked by monsters. At age three she was found in an alleyway by Sally Jackson and grew up as Percy's 'twin' sister. When the lighting bolt is stolen Athena slowly begins to ****realize**** that the demi-god helping Jackson is actually her own daughter. **

_**Leaving Yancy Academy, Percy Jackson**_

I never wanted to admit this before, but for those last few months of the semester me and Annabeth thought we were going insane. We've never thought that before, at least, not the two of us at the same time. There have always been moments in fights where we have gotten one point across or another and then suddenly the other person is insane for the next few days. Considering how intelligent Annabeth is, you can guess that I was always on the receiving end of that one. However, this time we were both being looked at like there was something seriously wrong with our heads and even Annabeth couldn't come up with another plausible explanation other than we hallucinated the whole thing.

We used the tactic that we always did back in our little apartment with mom and dropped subtle mentions of Mrs. Dodds all over the place but we'd just get that look again. After the incident, as we now called it, I would constantly wake up after a nightmare about Mrs. Dodds becoming a monster bent on killing me and my sister. Annabeth said she had the same problem and to block it from her mind she studied non-stop around the clock. She had to sleep, obviously, but it was never for long and pretty soon we were both getting really cranky. The only thing that assured us that we were not going insane was the way Grover reacted to Mrs. Dodds name.

He hesitated before answering that he had no idea what we were talking about and Annabeth called him on it right then and there. It was the most intelligent thing to do, as always, and Grover started to hesitate for longer periods of time after that. That gave us a momentary reprieve before the nightmares returned full force and, even worse than with me, Annabeth started to get migraines for days on end. She wouldn't take time off of classes because of how she couldn't shake her know-it-all attitude. My grades dropped all down to F's whilst Annabeth managed to keep hers at the very top only because of how much she needed a distraction.

It took a while, what with all of the distractions that we managed to provide ourselves with, but then one day we both snapped at the same time but in different classes. I shouted at my teacher when he told me off for talking when I'd never done a thing and used a colourful swear word I picked up from the kids years older than me whilst Annabeth had been accused of cheating her entire life on tests and she had put the teacher in his place. It must have been a sight to see since over the last few weeks the kids from that class had been giving her the thumbs up and approving nods wherever she went. I wanted to ask what she had said but her mood told me to wait.

We both got hauled off to the headmasters office and he was way stricter that day than on any other when we'd been taken there. He sent a letter home to our mom confirming that we would not be invited back to Yancy Academy next year and also sent a letter saying that Annabeth was a big cause for concern and that she should be watched carefully when she returned home. Now, I may not be as smart as my twin sister but I know when something is up and believe me something was definitely up right then. When we got out of the headmasters office I decided to suck it up and ask her.

I wasn't exactly prepared for what she told me.

"I cursed Mr. Riez in six different languages and swore at him with every word I knew," Annabeth admitted. "Then I argued with him about my supposed 'cheating through life' and blamed his attitude to my intelligence on the affair he was having and how someone should sent a letter to his wife who is most probably sleeping with five other men as we speak."

My eyebrows could have disappeared from my face right then. This was Annabeth, my know-it-all twin sister, and she had said all of _that_ to a teacher? And in six different languages?

"Wow, Annabeth. I didn't know you had it in you," I said with a grin at the thought of all of that being true. Mr. Riez was a mean spirited man who was a poor excuse for a teacher and needed to be taken down a peg or two.

Annabeth rubbed her temples with her hands. "Yeah, well, the headaches have been getting worse for the past two days. I can't even get to sleep now because of the nightmares of Mrs. Dodds turning into that... into that... _thing_."

I nodded, completely understanding how she felt right then.

We had one week left until we got to go home for the summer and the exams were finally starting. As usual, Annabeth had aced all of them but that didn't mean the teachers weren't watching her more carefully than usual. Eventually, they all decided that it had something to do with the incident that they caught wind of from the other kids. They put it all down to that and before you knew it Annabeth was being given advice on how to tell the difference between a hallucination and reality. The other kids thought she'd gone crazy until they saw her grades. It was pretty amazing to see that many mouths fall open at once and all about the same thing. Our names were right next to each other and here is what you could see.

_Annabeth Jackson: A+ A+ A+ A+ A+ A+_  
_Percy Jackson: _

Just think of your own reaction to something like that from a sixth grader and then you'll understand what I'm talking about. I wasn't looking forward to the look on my mom's face when she saw my report card this time around. Anyway, Annabeth and me kept hanging out for every piece of free time we got because our problem was getting a little out of hand. Correction, our 'little' problem was actually a very big problem but we just didn't know it yet. One night, Annabeth's headaches got so bad that she actually started to cringe and she had never cringed before. Cursed, given a slight grimace and jerked backwards was what she had always done when she got hurt but never cringed.

I suggested that we go for a walk and Annabeth jumped on the idea. She'd gone through all of the books she'd been given a hundred times since the incident at the museum with Mrs. Dodds and that left her with absolutely nothing to do but wallow in her pain and uncertainty. We were walking through the corridor where our Latin class is held and I had the idea to go and apologize to Mr. Brunner for the terrible grade I was about to get in his exam tomorrow morning but we stopped in the hallway. The door to his room was slightly ajar with light streaming through it and we could hear the voices of Mr. Brunner and Grover coming from the other side.

"... I'm worried about them," Grover was saying. "Imagine, a Kindly One in the _school_! And accusing them both off..."

We moved closer to the door to listen to their conversation. The eavesdropper of this family was always Annabeth but this time I just couldn't help it.

"... Mr. Underwood, I know. It has confirmed something that I was confused about all along. They really are twins."

"I know, sir. You wouldn't think it if you looked at them, would you?"

Me and Annabeth glanced at one another. That was a little harsh coming from Grover. I had black hair and sea green eyes from our father's side. Mom would always use him to describe me since I looked just like him but Annabeth always felt left out when it came to the appearances talk. You see, mom always told us that the blonde gene had come from her uncle who she had lived with as a child and it had skipped a few generations before landing itself in Annabeth. Also, Annabeth had these stormy grey eyes that made you want to look away if she glared at you and mom had a picture of our grandfather who had eyes that were almost exactly the same. That had explained everything to us

"But two of them? Grover, do you know how bad this looks? Two powerful children like that and taking on a Kindly One when they are supposed to have no training... this will be hard to explain."

"Sir, they suspect about what happened in the museum. Annabeth came right out and called me on it only a week after it happened and she is not being fooled by the mist like Percy. And the outburst in that class..."

"Grover, we must keep them safe from harm. Having them die will only complicate the situation further. I have faith that everything will work itself out..."

I dropped my Latin book that I was planning on returning to Mr. Brunner and it landed with a _thud_ on the floor. The conversation on the other side of the door came to an abrupt halt and I could hear what sounded like muffled hooves moving towards the door. Luckily for me, I had a sister who had done this kind of thing before and she yanked me into another classroom and behind the door just as I picked up my book and the door to the Latin classroom opened. We both waited there for a while and just as we were about to sneak out we heard the noise of hooves moving closer and closer towards us.

Back then I wasn't too concerned about people hearing my breathing but Annabeth was smart enough to know and elbowed me so that she could let me know. The door to the classroom opened all the way and we had to squeeze into small space that was left in the corner of the room. Trust me, it wasn't exactly comfortable in there but it kept us out of trouble. Right then, we heard Grover's voice speaking.

"What is it, sir?" He asked.

There was a short moment of silence before Mr. Brunner replied, "Nothing, I thought I heard something. Must be some students out for a stroll."

He had gotten that part right at least.

As Mr. Brunner left, the sound of hooves slowly died down and Annabeth moved the door so that it closed just as Mr. Brunner left. We both let out a sigh of relief at the same time. We'd had some close calls before but getting caught right now when we are so close to being kicked out onto the streets and being permanently expelled a week early is not something that I would advise to anyone. True, we weren't going to be invited back next year and that was an expulsion in one form but getting expelled with one week left basically meant that us getting into any other school was a long shot at best.

We shared a look and silently agreed on one thing. Once we got through the week we were going to put this whole mess behind us. Or so we hoped...

I went straight to Grover once Annabeth had gone back to her own dormitory to try and get some sleep. Of course, my friend denied everything until I told him that me and Annabeth had been eavesdropping on the end of their conversation. He tried to weasel his way out of it, typical Grover, but I grew up with Annabeth so I know each and every way a person will try to avoid doing something. By the time our talk was done I was just more confused than before. Grover had been talking about our safety and people who weren't normal just like we weren't and in the end I just told him to go to sleep.

How was I supposed to understand the guy when he couldn't finish over half of his sentences?

Over the last week of the semester the exams were hell for me and a breeze for Annabeth. Problem was, she was still having those headaches and as the days wore on you could see the rings under her eyes becoming permanent additions to her face and that was when the Yancy Academy's nurse gave her some paracetamol when she came clean about the headaches. From the amount of cursing she threw at me when I asked her if I could borrow a pen, I guessed that all it did was make them worse. I was right. She was feeling worse than I did after the three hour Latin exam that we had to sit and I could see all of my misspelled words on my eyelids for the next day and a half.

However, after the exam, Mr. Brunner called me back for a word.

"Mr. Jackson," He said. "I don't want you to feel upset because you will not be returning to Yancy Academy next year. I understand that you tried your best but it's just not meant to be. You and Annabeth aren't cut out for this school."

My eyes narrowed. My mood has been really bad, as I said, so this was kind of another reason for my temper to snap. "You mean because I'm not smart enough to be here?" I asked. "Annabeth is. Let her stay."

Mr. Brunner sighed. "I am not the headmaster, Mr. Jackson. Your sister is a smart person, yes, but you two just aren't... normal."

My narrowed eyes became a glare. "We're not _normal_?" I hissed. "And everyone else in this school is? Mr. Brunner, it's a place for troubled kids. That's why we were sent here."

Once more, he sighed. "Just remember that you are meant for great things, Percy Jackson. Now, I'm sure you have things to be getting on with."

That was the last conversation I had with Mr. Brunner at Yancy Academy because he disappeared three days before the semester ended and at the time I didn't particularly care. I didn't care for a long time after that. Me and Annabeth were so cranky that when the last day of school rolled by and we were packing and boarding the school bus to go home I could see the relief on her face. I was relieved too. As the bus started up, Annabeth commented that her headaches were getting less painful and I commented on how I was starting to feel a little better too. When we got out onto the open road it was like an anvil had been lifted off our shoulders. Unfortunately, it did nothing to improve my mood with Grover about his secrets.

Me and Annabeth talked on the bus about what we were going to do once we got home. Number one on our list was avoiding our step-father Gabe Ugliano who we had nicknamed Smelly Gabe as kids although mom always said that it was me who first introduced the nickname when we were talking about him. On the bus Nancy Bobofit decided that it would be cool to pick on Grover one last time before she didn't get the chance to for a few weeks and I must give credit to Annabeth here. She had said that the headaches were going down but she was nowhere near as good as I was feeling and I still felt a little queasy. The second one thing left Nancy's lunchbox, Annabeth had vaulted the back of our seat and pinned the unfortunate girl against the wall with a wild look in her eyes.

"If you don't want to get even uglier, I'd stop it." She snarled before releasing Nancy who had a look of pure terror on her face and sitting back down in her seat beside me and Grover.

I waited a moment to let her calm down before asking, "Hey, Annabeth, are you okay?"

She shook her head. "No. I feel worse than I ever have before but it's a little better than back at Yancy Academy."

I nod in understanding. After all, I'd felt pretty bad myself for the last few months. "Well, when we get home we can tell mom and she'll be able to do something. She always does."

Annabeth nodded in reply, looking out the window at New York. You may not know this but Annabeth's dream is to become an architect. She could redesign the whole of New York and I guarantee it would look ten times better than it does now. We share a room back home and her half is full of pieces of paper of all the buildings she's designed. Mom loves them all because they're really detailed and Annabeth has a future that's way brighter than mine but that doesn't mean mom doesn't try to help me out a bit. I've ever thought about what I want to do when I grow up because I never thought that there would be something I could do for a job. A worker in a place like McDonald's seemed like my only option right then.

A few minutes later, a loud sound was hear from the engine and black smoke came out from under the hood which caused us all to choke inside the bus. The driver opened the doors and we all got out. Grover avoided the greyhound that was onboard like it was a lion or something and we continued our conversations outside. I didn't notice it at first but then I did. There were three old ladies across the street who looked older than ancient and they were knitting with balls of yarn whilst looking right at me. They weren't looking at Annabeth or Grover, just right at me as if I was the only person in existence.

"Hey, Grover, what do you think they're knitting?" I asked, trying to make a happy atmosphere.

Grover looked at the three older woman across the road and went as pale as a piece of white paper. He looked away and grabbed Annabeth so that she was didn't even get a chance to look at the three woman across the road. I've never seen Grover looked this nervous or afraid.

"Percy, are they looking at you?" He questioned with fear in his voice.

"What? Why does that matter?"

"Just tell me, Percy. Are those woman looking at you?"

I looked back at the three woman across the road and, sure enough, they were still staring right at me. "Yep. They are."

Grover started trembling out of fear. I was certain that he was about to have a panic attack or something. "No, no. Not again. Oh, gods, please, not again. Sixth grade. They never live past sixth grade..."

"Grover, what are you talking about?" Annabeth asked, now getting concerned for our shared friend.

"Let's get back on the bus." Grover said firmly.

"What? Grover, buddy, it's like a thousand degrees in there." I reminded him pointedly. Who wanted to stay in a boiling hot box made of metal?

"No. Percy, we have to get back on the bus. Come on."

But I wasn't listening. I was watching the three woman across the road again who really did look like they were older than a thousand years old. I couldn't believe that no-one else had noticed them. People are always noticing how old the elderly are and if they saw people like that I'm certain they'd be phoning up the world records or something. There were two woman holding balls of blue yawn and one woman was stood in the middle with a pair of large scissors. I continued to watch as they snipped the line and suddenly I felt all cold inside. It made me feel terrible in the space of a few seconds and I was moving out of their line of sight and towards Annabeth in the next moment.

"Percy, what's up?" She questioned in confusion as I was suddenly beside her.

"I don't know, I just feel... cold. You know, inside and I feel like I've got death on my back." I tried to explain but the only thing it seemed to do was make Grover, who was standing nearby, shake with fear.

"No, no, no. Not happening, not going to happen, going to lose my licence..." He kept mumbling to himself and I was one hundred percent certain that he had a problem I needed to help him fix. His emotions were more out of whack than my own.

There was a loud chugga sound from the engine and then it roared back to life. Everyone gave a cheer and the driver slapped the hood of the car with his hat.

"You beauty! Alright! Everyone back on the bus!" He shouted and we all clambered back on.

The rest of the bus ride was spent with Grover muttering things that didn't mean anything to us at the time but would mean a lot to me later on. As we got closer to home me and Annabeth got more and more excited about being with our mom again. The other kids got off each time the bus stopped and the end of the line was at the station. It took a long while to get there, or at least it seemed like a long while, because every ten seconds Annabeth would wince from her headaches and the pain she was feeling would show up on her face. I could never concentrate on anything when my mom or Annabeth had something wrong with them and when we got off the bus I was pretty tired.

Grover was so shaken up that he made us promise to wait for him as he went to the bathroom like he always had to when he got nervous. Don't call me bad or anything but me and Annabeth didn't wait for him. I doubt Annabeth would have left Grover alone if she didn't have those headaches and she could think straight. We hired a taxi and I paid the driver to take us to our street because Annabeth looked pale enough to match Grover and things were obviously going to turn sour pretty soon. I did not want to be vomited on by her and that was why I spent the entire cab ride with my body squished against the door.

When we arrived at our street, I had to help Annabeth out and once she got out I could see the colour start to return to her face. It must have been something in the air down by that area of New York because once we got to our apartment she looked way better than before. I opened the door, once again, with my key and when we got inside we were greeted by the smell of cigar smoke and beer mixed with this cheap kind of cologne. Annabeth made a B-line for the kitchen and I joined her. I knew right away that Gabe was home and sure enough we caught sight of him playing poker with his friends as we walked past. Annabeth managed to get past but I didn't.

"Your home," Gabe stated simply. I never cared about his feelings so I was used to this. "You got any money?"

This is one of the reasons I hate Gabe. He'd ask me for money when mom wasn't home and call it our 'guy' secret. I hated every second of knowing him and I always will.

"No."

"You must have paid for the cab in cash and you and the girl would have cost over ten bucks so you'd have seven or eight left." Gabe said. He's not smart. He just knows money.

I sighed in exasperation and pulled out my cash from my pocket before slamming it on his side of the table. Then, I remembered something Annabeth gave to me to get him off my back for the whole summer.

"Oh, Gabe," I said to get his attention. I handed him a list of things Annabeth wrote. "Annabeth says this is for your... uh... winning arrangement?"

Gabe actually grinned at me. "Oh, yes," He said whilst looking at the list with a look of pride on his face. "Well then, you two just go and play. I'll be here." Was he actually trying to be civil? What had Annabeth done here?

"Yeah, whatever." I muttered before walking into the kitchen to join Annabeth. She had a half empty glass of water in her hand and still looked a little pale. All of the smoke probably wasn't helping much either. "So, what was that list you wanted me to give to Gabe?"

She shrugged her shoulders. "Stuff on who's bluffing and all that. He wins too much to drink it all away so mom gets some of it and he stays off our backs the whole summer. That's the arrangement we have."

"What? You help him win his gambling and we don't have to see him so much?"

Annabeth nodded. "Pretty much, yeah." She said before refilling her glass. "Ugh, I need the strongest pain killers _ever_."

I didn't doubt that for a second. If I had my way, I'd be out there buying them for her right now. Then, I heard a sound at the door and when we heard the next voice relief flooded through us.

"I'm home!" Our mom shouted as she came through the door.


	4. My Brother's Friend Loses His Trousers

**Hidden Away**

**Disclaimer: I own nothing, all credit goes to the owner/creator of Percy Jackson. **

**Summary: Cursed so that Athena can never sense her, Annabeth is constantly attacked by monsters. At age three she was found in an alleyway by Sally Jackson and grew up as Percy's 'twin' sister. When the lighting bolt is stolen Athena slowly begins to ****realize**** that the demi-god helping Jackson is actually her own daughter. **

_**My Brother's Friend Loses His Trousers, Annabeth Jackson (Chase)**_

I was feeling pretty bad in the taxi because the headaches had started getting worse again. At first, I had hoped that getting away from Yancy Academy would have been enough for me but apparently not. Fortunately for me and Percy, I had our homecoming sorted for the summer. That list I gave him had the names of every guy who would cheat and how to catch them at it. I was pretty thorough this time around and I made a deal with Gabe last autumn. He wins lots of money, which he obviously liked, but he had to give twenty percent to my mom and lay off me and Percy for the entire holidays. Considering the fact that he didn't want to see us anyway, it didn't take long to convince him it was a good deal.

The only thing he was worried about was the money he would be giving my mom and since he knows nothing about percentages I told him that twenty percent was only a fifth of it and that was about the size of my hand. He warmed up to the idea then but I'm not sure if he's realized his mistake or not.

I had dumped my suitcase on the kitchen floor in my haste to get a drink of water for my headache which meant bending over to pick it up. I'd never advise to anyone with a headache to pick something up from the floor. Your head will do it's best to punish you later on. So, when Percy came back and I had explained everything to him about the list and all that we heard the door open and the one person we came to see enter the apartment.

That was our mother.

Sally Jackson.

I still wish things were as they were right then. I'd even put up with Smelly Gabe just to be able to be with my mom for days on end but the time for that came and went. But right then I had no idea any of _that _was going to happen so I was more than happy when she walked right into the kitchen with armfuls of grocery shopping. She smiled the moment she caught sight of us and me and Percy took the shopping from her arms so that we could be in them instead. In my opinion, and I'm sure Percy has one too, mom deserves to live in a mansion up in the wealthier side of New York. You want to know why?

My mom is the sweetest, kindest and most caring person I have ever and will ever meet. Her long brown hair has barely noticeable strands of grey in it that are no doubt caused by the stress of having to raise two kids who fight all the time and being stuck with Smelly Gabe. I know from personal experience that when she's in a good mood her eyes can change colour and just the sound of her voice could stop me and Percy from fighting for a long, long time. Well, so long as we still lived close to her otherwise it would last a day at the most. So, you should understand by now. My mom was a _goddess_, as I had said many times before. I would really be kicking myself when I found out just how true that was.

"Oh, Percy," She gave him a tight squeeze. "Annabeth," She squeezed me tight too. "You've grown so much since Christmas. You're the same height now."

Yeah, believe me, I did _not_ like being half an inch shorter than Percy for the whole of fifth grade but someone must have been smiling on me right then because I got my first growth spurt just after Christmas and that meant I only spent half of my sixth grade stuck shorter than Percy.

You might not believe me, but my headache was gone like _that_. It might have had something to do with the way her red, white and blue uniform for the Sweet on America candy shop smelled but I just did not care. For your information, my mom works at a sweet shop to get the money she needs to go to evening classes and get her highschool diploma and stuff like that. Her parents died when she was five and the uncle who raised her got cancer in her senior year so she had to drop out to help him. That meant no high school diploma for my mom and no good break for the woman who had done nothing wrong in her life. I always got mad over that.

When she eventually let us go I spotted the huge amount of free samples she'd brought home for us. There was one bag for Percy and one bag for me. Both were filled with blue sweets. Never heard of blue food? Well, you haven't lived until you've tried it. It's the best type of food in the whole world and my mom can make any sort of food blue. I've had toast that was blue, a packet of crisps that were blue, some chocolate that was blue and lots of other stuff that was all coloured blue. Nothing else could ever compare to it and that's why I always thought that my mom was the best cook in the world. Still is in my opinion.

We helped mom put away the groceries and afterwards we all went into mine and Percy's shared room. My side was exactly how I remembered it. Papers strewn about everywhere with pictures of the monuments I had designed and books about everything I could get my hands on piled underneath my bed. Percy's side looked like mom had given it a good shot at cleaning because his was the only side she could actually get through in under a week. Also, the entire room stunk of Smelly Gabe. He knew that he couldn't do anything to our stuff so he just used his odor to give us nightmares about overweight pigs in mud.

Percy sat on his bed and I had to do a leap of faith over the paper on the floor to get to mine and narrowly missed hitting my head on the wall as I always did. I had to remember to make a way for me to get through to my bed without damaging any of my drawings one day. So, mom couldn't get to my bed for obvious reasons and she sat on Percy's instead but I didn't feel left out at all. I could still hear and see her and that was good enough for me. Percy started eating his samples like they were his life line or something whilst I, not wanting to choke and die, ate them like a normal person would who actually wanted to listen to the mother that they hadn't seen since Christmas.

Mom wanted to know about everything we did for the semester that wasn't mentioned in any of our letters. I wrote about _everything_ that happened in my days so she really only needed Percy for filling in the gaps and all that. We had decided never to tell mom about the hallucination we had with the ADHD even though we were both sure that it wasn't one. Unfortunately, my mind said that things like that couldn't possibly exist and every time Percy tried to come up with a new idea I just had to go and squash it. I was getting rather fed up with my smart-ass brain for a few moments there.

Surprisingly, she didn't say a word about the cautioning letter they sent about me or the expulsion that was more my fault than Percy's this time around. At least we got to finish the year even though we weren't official students by the time it ended. Our report cards came in the mail and she said she was very proud of me and Percy this year. Percy looked like he'd been hit on the head with a mallet because all he got were F's this time around whilst I got straight A's. Usually he would get D's and a few C's if I could manage to help him out enough the day before the exam. But this time it was way too stressful for me to help him out and he was too stressed to study so he failed on everything.

The only things she was interested in was whether or not we were okay and how we had been feeling since Christmas. Neither of us had the heart to tell her that we'd been feeling terrible for the past few days as she'd only blame herself and a woman like mom shouldn't have to blame herself for anything. It was something to do with us and not her. I was so certain of that at the time.

Just as we started discussing plans for the summer, Smelly Gabe's voice rang out loud and clear. "Sally, how about some bean dip for me and my friends, huh?"

I was ready to kill him for ruining this moment between me, Percy and our mom and by the way my brother was gritting his teeth I could tell that he was thinking about Gabe's death too. We continued our conversation like nothing had happened and me and Percy worked doubly hard to sound upbeat about our last few days at Yancy Academy to make mom feel better. She had been living with Gabe for months without us so I didn't want to take any chances about her falling into depression because of how unfortunate her life was. I made a promise when I was young that every chance I got I would try to move mom away from Gabe and I must say there have been some close calls but then she seemed to remember something and her decision stood firm. She would never tell me what that thing was.

Then Percy made the mistake of mentioning the museum and choking up.

"What's wrong?" Mom asked. "Did something scare you? You didn't get into a fit with one another inside did you?"

I couldn't help but smile. "It's okay, mom. We didn't hurt each other very badly." I said and she seemed to relax but gave me a slightly exasperated look. She knew who won all the fights around here about as well as Percy did. My answer got mom off the topic of the museum quickly and Percy sent me a thankful look. He probably wanted to talk to her about Mrs. Dodds and the three woman he had told me about with the yarn.

"I have a surprise for the two of you," She said unexpectedly. "We're going to the beach."

I've never sat up straighter in my life and I literally heard Percy's spine crack from across the room as he did the same. We both had huge smiles on our faces by now.

"Montauk?" Percy asked hopefully and I was actually praying for this to happen.

"Three nights. Exact same cabin."

"When?" I asked.

She smiled warmly at me. "Just as soon as I get changed."

Me and Percy shared looks of pure glee and I knew that I wouldn't be unpacking my suitcase today. Everything in it was clean because I, unlike my idiot of a brother, had actually made sure that everything was washed so that mom had less to do when we came home. I actually wanted to talk to her without watching her do the laundry this summer.

I was feeling ecstatic until Gabe appeared in the doorway.

"Bean dip, Sally? Didn't you hear?" He said with a slight edge to his voice and I wanted to beat him up so badly right then. I could see Percy's hand turn into a fist and inch forwards slightly. You know what they say. Great minds think alike. Mom gave us a look that made us stop getting ready to beat up Gabe.

"I was about to get some, honey. We were just discussing the trip." She said.

Gabe got this weird look on his face that could have been realization but I knew he was too dumb to actually realize anything.

"You were actually serious about that beach trip?"

"Knew it. He's not letting us go." Percy muttered to me and I nodded in agreement.

"Of course he is, sweetie. Your step-father is just a little concerned about money and having us gone for a few days." Somehow I doubted that. "But he won't have to just settle for bean dip. I'm going to make him guacamole, fried chicken... you know, the works."

I knew mom had him there. Food it the secret to Smelly Gabe's soul around here and mom has been using it for years. I saw Gabe soften a little.

"So, uh, this money for the trip... it comes out of your budget right?" He asked and I held back a snort. A three day trip to Montauk was hardly going to cost that much to him but mom's budget is about as big as mine and Percy's allowance put together. Plus, it has to cover everything she wants to get so that's enough to cover a few evening classes a week.

"Yes, honey," Mom replied.

"And you ain't gonna take my car anywhere but there 'n back?"

"We promise to be very careful."

I rolled my eyes as Gabe scratched his stubbled double chin.

"Well... maybe if you hurry up with the dip and _that_ kid," He jerked his head in Percy's direction. "Apologizes for interrupting my very important poker game just as my winning streak started."

A few words on this. The reason Gabe's winning streak had just started was because of the note that I made with all of those answers for him. He couldn't win with that tiny brain of his trying to figure out who was lying and who wasn't. Percy had a look on his face that said he'd rather be back at Yancy Academy than apologize but a quick kick when Gabe wasn't looking coupled with moms pleading look was enough to get him to cough one up. I must say that in that moment I was proud of him. I'd been teaching him how to lie like a pro for years now and he always let something slip but not this time. I couldn't find one bit of sarcasm as he apologized and Gabe couldn't either. That meant that Smelly Gabe left quickly and I let out a sigh of relief. I could actually breathe fresh air again.

"Thank you, Percy." Our mother said with relief in her voice. "As soon as we get to Montauk we can talk about that... _secret_ you two have been keeping from me about the museum."

I tensed up. Oh dear god she _knew_. How? How in the would had she managed that? I was fumbling over excuses in my head at this point since I knew it would take the best to get past this one unscaved. That's when I noticed this strange look in her eyes. They had turned a depressing shade of light brown for half a moment before her usual happy attitude returned. She ruffled Percy's hair so that it was even messier than before and blew me a kiss before walking out of the room to make Gabe his dip and all the other stuff she promised him. I wasn't too happy about her leaving but the fact that I was eating a blue jelly bean at that exact moment helped me out a little bit.

"You don't suppose she's been thinking of dad lately, do you?" Percy asked me with a worried look on his face. We hardly ever got to talk about dad at home because of Gabe and his minions.

"I think so," I replied. "It's our birthday soon and you know how she gets when summer comes around. Maybe we could convince her that things aren't so bad."

"And how aren't things so bad?"

"I haven't killed you yet, have I?" I said with a smug smile.

Percy glared at me and sniffed his top before reeling back in disgust. "Woah! I think Yancy Academy gave me a hygiene problem."

"That just hit you now, huh?"

It took an hour and me kicking Percy in the shins before we were finally ready to leave. I didn't have to pack my own suitcase but I did have to help out Percy because he is such an unorganized oaf. We stuffed all of his dirty clothes into the washing machine and made it so that when it all finished in two hours time there would be a loud alarm sounding throughout the whole apartment. Hopefully that would be enough to get Smelly Gabe off his butt long enough to notice that he actually had to do something other than play poker with those moronic friends of his. I was glad we did this for two reasons.

One, he had the nerve to treat mom like dirt when she was worth a billion of him. Two, when we were dragging all the suitcases to the car he was stood there groaning about losing mom for three days straight and, more important to him, his '78 Camaro. He was annoyed about losing mom because that meant no cooking and no clean clothes unless he wanted to wear Percy's once the washing machine was finished with them. I was half surprised that the poor thing hadn't broken down the moment one of his smelly socks was thrown inside and the 'on' button was pushed. I know that I wouldn't have been able to handle it.

"Not a thing on this car, runts," He had said in his annoying voice. "Not even a sun spot."

I found that to be rather stupid since I didn't even think that cars could _get_ sun spots but correcting him would have been against mom's rules and I really wanted to go to Montauk this weekend. Percy grumbled to me about twelve year olds not being able to drive and I had to prevent myself from telling him that I had read a book on cars at the Yancy library when I got bored and knew how to drive one in theory. Oh well, if the worst came to the worst I was totally prepared to drive Gabe's '78 Camaro into the sea just to see the look on his face when I told him that people he'd cheated at poker had done it. He was so easy to lie to.

Then, right when he turned and walked back inside the apartment building, I got this real strange feeling that someone was watching me. I turned around and looked over the Camaro and sure enough there was this bearded guy with black hair and sea green eyes standing on the other side of the road looking at me as if I was a potential threat or something. I got confused and was about to get Percy to take a look when a van labeled 'Cable Install' drove past and the next thing I knew the man was gone. Well, that was something that I shrugged off right away but I probably shouldn't have. It was the unofficial second thing that happened in my nightmare.

So, I was kinda freaked out by that and got into the car with Percy right away. We told our mom to hit the gas and before you could say vacation we were out of there.

The rental cabin that we go to is right at the tip of Long Island where the winds are strongest and the view is beautiful. It was basically a little box with small rooms that meant me and Percy had to sleep side by side, curtains that looked older than time itself and faded out walls with a sea that was below freezing in the peak of summer time. It's no wonder that we all loved the place. Mom loved it because she could walk all day and forget all of her worries in a matter of seconds. Percy loved it because we'd been going there ever since we were babies. I loved it because of all the happy memories and freedom that it gave us. We could actually be a normal family when we where there.

Actually, the main reason that mom loved the place was because it was where she'd met our dad. He was the one good break she got in her life. Her parents had died in a place crash when she was five and the uncle that looked after her didn't really care what she said or did. In fact, as we were in the car and I was riding shotgun because the rule stated that 'girls stick together' I saw her eyes change colour again. Percy saw it too because we were having a sort of miniature argument about what baseball team was better and he was leaning forwards from the back. Her eyes turned the colour of Percy's and that meant the colour of the sea. I felt kind of left out then but then I realized that it was just eye colour and that was it.

It was almost sun set when we arrived and so there was a warm red glow from the sun settling over the cabin. I don't think anyone else ever uses it and it was exactly the same as I remembered it. Me and Percy went into the room that we shared and set up our sleeping arrangements so that we were as far away from each other as possible but that left only enough space for mom to walk through. I didn't mind much though. Mom opened all the windows to let the sea air in and I watched as they cleaned out the cabinets. I can't go through any of the old cabinets because of a small problem that I have.

You see, I have arachnophobia. That's a fear of spiders.

Percy would constantly tease me about it because it was the one flaw that he could keep using against me without it losing its touch. When I was three and really clingy, which mean I would not leave mom's side, I had an encounter with a spider that I was one hundred percent positive was talking to me. It said some really hurtful stuff about my mom and I killed it in her defence. Then, out of literally nowhere, hundreds of large spiders showed up and started to chase me. This was in the pre-school that me and Percy went to. Everyone stood on the tables to get away and my mom took both me and Percy back home in the car after dousing the spiders with insect repellent. Needless to say, I've been afraid of them ever since.

After that we went for some walks on the beach, told stories about what we'd been doing since Christmas and I ended up feeding Percy's blue jam sandwich to the seagulls. We got into a shoving match and that's when I pushed him right into the sea just as a wave came crashing down on him. I laughed so much that my sides felt like they were splitting when he came back up because you'll never guess what was on his head. Seaweed. Green seaweed that covered his entire head. He grumbled and threw it off of him in embarrassment. That's when I came up with the best name in my entire life.

"How'ya doing down there, _seaweed brain_." I taunted him before bursting out into laughter once more. He threw some wet sand at me and it came up with this beard type shape on my chin. Percy started to laugh.

"Feeling fine, _wise girl_." He taunted right back and I lost my temper.

I swiped the wet sand off my face and launched myself at him. Unfortunately for both of us, I never got the chance to hit him because at that moment several waves came by and hit us in rapid succession. The end result was us being washed up onto the shore with a fit of coughs before we looked at each others disheveled appearance and burst out laughing again. I didn't know if it was my imagination at the time but the sea seemed to be relaxing when it saw us both laughing after we'd nearly had a fight just like ordinary siblings would when something like that happened.

Our mom didn't seem to mind the fact that we'd nearly gotten into a fight but she did make sure we both warmed up by the fire at the cabin afterwards. She kept giving this wary glance towards the sea as if it would rise up and at any minute and swallow her whole but me and Percy were too busy eating free samples and having our own ten second food fights to notice. It was dark by now but we didn't really care and I was in the process of eating a blue string of sugar puffs when I choked because of the question Percy asked our mom.

He asked about our father.

I gave him a hard kick and a shake of the head that clearly said to drop the subject but mom had other ideas. I guess she had finally decided to tell us a little about the guy who had never been there. Mom had told Percy about our father loads of times but whenever I asked she would just avoid the question. I had a feeling that it was because Percy reminded her of dad and so she could talk to him more easily about it.

"He was wonderful, Percy." Mom replied. "Sweet, caring, gentle and powerful. He was handsome and tall, too. You inherited his black hair, Percy. And his green eyes." She sighed and looked off towards the sea as if she was imagining that he was somewhere out there right now. From what we knew, he had sailed off one day and gotten lost at sea. "He would be so proud of you two... if only he could see you now."

Me and Percy had sad smiles on our faces. Mom made dad sound like he was the best guy in the world and I would say that he had to have been to give mom the best break of her entire life. We roasted some marshmallows on the fire and ate them. I was wondering if what mom said was true. Would our dad be proud of us? We had gotten ourselves kicked out of every school we'd ever been to and had letters sent home voicing concern about our mental health several times. True, I had gotten one hundred percent in all my exams but Percy hadn't and I wasn't about to have a father who was proud of me but not proud of Percy. In my opinion, parents shouldn't have favorites.

"How old were we?" Percy questioned. "I mean, when he left us..."

"We were only together for one summer, Percy. On this exact same beach." She said. I got confused.

"But... didn't he know us as babies?" I asked.

"No, honey. I told him I was expecting a baby, or as it turned out to be babies, but he never got the chance to see either of you. He was forced to leave before your births."

I felt really angry at my dad right then. He was _forced _to leave? Unless that was anything other than having a bag put over his head and being dragged away on board a boat as he fought to get back then I wasn't about to forgive him. Ever. How could any sane person leave a woman like our mother? I was seriously considering putting up fliers around New York about wonder woman in disguise and how she was looking for a man to sweep her off her feet. All that I needed to do was get rid of Smelly Gabe and we were set. I was starting to formulate a plan in my head which involved getting him deported when Percy interrupted the silence again.

"You're not going to send us away again, are you?" He asked. "To another one of those special boarding schools?"

She pulled her crisp marshmallow out from the flames. It had been burned ever so slightly but not in the bad way. My mom knew how to cook anything and marshmallows on fires was no exception.

"I'm not sure, Percy." She said. "I never wanted to do this but... I think, yes, we'll have to do something for the both of you."

I frowned. "Is it because we make your life hard?" I asked and was eating my words the next second. Percy gave me a huge warning look but it was too late. The words were out in the open.

"Oh, Annabeth," Our mom sighed and pulled me into a comforting hug. "No, you haven't made my life hard. Neither of you have. You're not to blame for the way things are."

"Then why do you keep sending us away?" I asked.

"It's for the best. For both of you."

"Because we're not normal?" Percy asked. I knew why he'd done that. Grover had said to Mr. Brunner that we weren't normal and it had been eating away inside of us both ever since we'd heard it.

"You say that like it's the worst thing in the world, Percy. It's really not. You have no idea how important you both are. To me more than anyone else. I just thought that Yancy Academy would be far enough away. I thought that you would both be able to stay together and be safe."

"Safe?" I asked. "Safe from what?"

Mom pulled back from the hug to look me in the eye and I could see tears welling up in hers. I didn't know what to do by that point and not knowing something is like my Achilles heal. I hate it. Percy moved so that he was sat right next to me and we could both wait for an answer from out mother but it wasn't exactly clear. I wanted to know everything that she wasn't telling me but she was never going to. It was obvious that we would never be told any time soon. Her eyes had gone back to that depressing brown colour that showed just how sad she was and I wanted more than ever to be able to read her mind and figure out what was wrong.

"I kept you both together even though it wasn't safe," She said. "I kept you close to me when they said it was too dangerous. A mistake they called it. There's only one other option for you two now. The place your father wanted to send you. But I just couldn't stand to do it... I never could."

Behind me, Percy shuffled in his seat. "Our father wanted to send us away to a special school where you wouldn't be?"

"No, Percy, not a school. Not to be away from me. It's a summer camp."

I looked over my shoulder at Percy and we both shared a confused look. Why would a father who abandoned us to a man like Smelly Gabe and set off on a sea voyage of all things so that he couldn't even witness our birth be discussing things like summer camps with our mother? From all of the evidence I've heard, he wasn't the type of person to care about his unborn children despite everything that our mother says. The piece of candy that had been thrown in the fire during our miniature food fights chose that moment to melt and sizzle violently, landing me and Percy with splodges of molten hot blue sweets on our foreheads. Let me just say, it hurt a lot.

"Ow!" We yelped in unison and our mother helped us to wipe the melted substance off our faces and thankfully it didn't leave a burn behind.

The distraction didn't last long as soon our minds were back on track and our mom could see the looks in our eyes.

"I'm sorry I never mentioned it before, you two but..." She sighed. "It might mean saying goodbye to you. For good this time."

"For good?" I repeated. "Mom, summer camps are just that. Summer camps. The rest of the year we'd be at home with you if we actually went... mom?"

She didn't reply. Just stared into the roaring flames of the fire and continued to think about whatever it was that was going on in her head.

There was a thunderstorm that night and I was awake reading a fiction book in my bed. I could never sleep through thunderstorms because of how I felt about them. It's like I said before, something about them just didn't feel right by me. There was always something in my head saying that I had to link the thunderstorm to something but the only thing I could think of was something that the thunderstorm gave birth to and lightning and rain didn't go very far in my mind. It was a rather bad storm that night and to make matters worse Percy was in the middle of a violent nightmare. I wasn't about to wake him. He'd teased me enough today so he could live through his nightmare.

It wasn't just a thunderstorm today. The waves of the sea were crashing against the shore and each one was about five meters tall. I could see everything if I looked out the window on the other side of the room but I preferred to stay in the comfort of my bed. I turned another page in my book when thunder clapped in the distance right after a flash of lightning and I saw the silhouette of someone out of the corner of my eye. In a second I was on my feet and walking towards the window. When I looked out I couldn't see anyone but I didn't even bother to look out of the one just through the doorway. If I had I might have seen the same black haired man standing there watching me with interest. His cautious look faded away to one of wonder.

There was another clap of thunder and Percy sat up straight in bed with a loud, "_No_!" being shouted from his lips. I jerked away from the window and went over to him to make sure he was okay. The man at the window had literally vanished into thin air but I was sure that I had just seen something in the rain. My mind was overly active all the time and it wasn't uncommon for me to make things up using my brain just to amuse me. It was a good thing I'd moved from the window because the next second the violent winds made it smash and fall inwards with a loud sound that woke both me and Percy up completely.

"Mom," We said at the same time before scrambling upright and rushing into the main part of the cabin where she was sleeping. Well, she wasn't exactly sleeping anymore since she was stood up, fully clothed and looking right at us with wide and concerned eyes. We all slept with our clothes on but mom looked like she hadn't even considered changing into her PJ's like we had pondered doing several times.

"Hurricane," She said and I knew right then that we needed to stop her sleeping in her clothes.

This was Long Island in New York we were talking about and it was early in the summer. Did we get hurricanes at this point in time? I do not think so. However, you know when people seem to forget that they're supposed to be doing something one day and then not doing it another? Well, that was what the sea was like today. It was worse than I thought it was from inside the cabin. The area around us was practically flooded, rain was coming from all directions, lighting was flashing every few seconds in the sky and thunder followed shortly afterwards. Percy was about as happy about it as I was and he kept flinching every time we heard a clap of thunder.

All of this I could see out the window and then I could have sworn I'd heard something. A woman's voice. It wasn't my moms since she was in the cabin with me but it had the same soothing effect and suddenly all of my troubles seemed so far away. Even if the voice was argumentative at the time. Then, there was another voice I heard and Percy heard it too. It was followed by a frantic pounding sound on our cabin door and we both turned away from the window to see who it was. Our mom sprang forwards and opened the door to reveal Grover standing there, soaked to the skin and looking paler than I've ever seen him. There was just something not quite right about him at that moment though.

"I've... I've... oh, gods, guys, I've been looking for you all night!" He gasped out. "What the Hades were you thinking?"

I blinked at him. Had he just substituted the word 'hell' for 'Hades'?

Our mother whirled around fast and looked at us both with terror in her eyes. I wasn't sure why that was but it scared me to hell.

"Children," She said and I knew things were bad. She only used the word 'children' when things were really, really bad. "What happened at the museum? What aren't you telling me?"

We both stood there stupidly looking at Grover and our mom as the storm raged all around us. Then Grover shouted something over the roaring winds that was in Ancient Greek but to me it was English. I didn't realize he'd spoken in another language or that Percy had understood him perfectly too.

"It's right behind me! How could you guys not tell her?!"

My quick mind caught up with the situation long enough for me to register one thing. Grover, my crippled friend, had gotten here in the middle of the night in a raging storm that would have given us problems walking through much less finding certain people through. I saw that his crutches weren't with him and me and Percy simultaneously gaped at his legs. You see, legs have skin on them and are the pinky flesh colour. But his were... his were... well, they were...

"What haven't you told me?" Our mom demanded to know.

We both started talking at the same time but she managed to understand what we were saying. We talked about Mrs. Dodds, the three old woman with the yarn, the museum things, the fountain and _everything_. It took us about twenty seconds to say and yet she still managed to hear every last word of it. By the time we were done she had a look on her face that I've never seen before. It was a mixture of urgency, realization, dread and fear. She rushed forwards and grabbed her purse from the table in the room.

"All of you get in the car. Now!"

We did as we were told. Me and Percy were too shocked to do anything but obey and it was the first time our mom had ever raised her voice at us. We literally ran outside and got into the Camaro as mom unlocked it with the keys from her purse. Percy got into the front which left me and Grover in the back but I wasn't too keen on being near him right now because of the small problem. Life lesson number one, always expect your day to be unexpected. I'll bet that nobody ever saw this coming though. Where my friend Grover's legs were supposed to be were, instead, a pair of dark brown, furry goat legs.


	5. A Bull Charges My Family

**Hidden Away**

**Disclaimer: I own nothing, all credit goes to the owner/creator of Percy Jackson. **

**Summary: Cursed so that Athena can never sense her, Annabeth is constantly attacked by monsters. At age three she was found in an alleyway by Sally Jackson and grew up as Percy's 'twin' sister. When the lighting bolt is stolen Athena slowly begins to ****realize**** that the demi-god helping Jackson is actually her own daughter. **

_**A Bull Charges My Family, Annabeth Jackson (Chase)**_

The rain hammered down on the Camaro. Wind rocked it from side to side. Lightning landed nearby making fires that were soon put out by the rain. All of this put together made driving impossible because you could not see a thing through the windshield. But my mother could and did. I thought she was taking a leap of faith the whole time since not once did her foot leave that gas pedal. Any normal person would have thought that insane but sitting in an unmoving car in a thunderstorm this bad was the only other option so I was quite happy to have mom drive like a maniac.

There was a flash of lightning every five seconds and that was the only time we could see anything clearly in the car. Naturally we used those moments to stare at Grover and his hooved legs. Me and Percy would keep looking at Grover, then down to his legs, then back at each other with a look that said we thought our friend had lost his marbles. Last I checked, legs with fur on them weren't exactly considered _normal_ by many people. Not only that, but these ones had hooves on them too. I was getting even more confused than I was already.

The worst thing about this was the smell. It smelt like animals did when they got wet and soggy. This was why I had never sat in the back seat before. Anything could just climb in there with me since there was an empty space right beside me whereas in the front seat that danger was non-existent. Now here I was sat beside someone who smelled worse than Percy's sweaty gym kit and I considered to be a friend. For that reason, I decided not to mention the fact that he smelled really bad. Through all the madness Percy managed to get a few words out from the front.

"And you know our mom how exactly?" He asked. I rolled my eyes at the question because it was pretty much the worst one anyone could think of.

"Wow, that's real subtle Percy." I said sarcastically.

Percy shot me a glare.

"Not exactly," Grover said cryptically. "Not fully. Not like we know each other. We've never met in person before but she knew I was watching you both."

"Watching us?"

"Making sure you stayed out of trouble. Keeping tabs on you." We both sent him identical glares. "But... but that's not to say that I was faking being a good friend. I am your friend. I love being your friend."

"What? Because you could leech off my homework and get to first place in the cafeteria line?"

"That was all great but I love being your friend for different reasons. I mean, you guys are so nice and intelligent... although that's usually just you Annabeth... and you never said anything about me being crippled -"

"Speaking of which," Percy cut in. "You don't look so crippled to me. You just look... um... what exactly _are_ you, Grover?"

"Not important," Grover mumbled whilst looking out of the window and munching on his fingernails.

"Not important? My... my _best friend_ is part _donkey_ from the waist down and -"

He was cut off by that annoying sound that Grover would make every once in a while. I was positive that he had a disfigured form of tyret's syndrome. It sounded like a sheep in a way. He would go _blah-ha-ha! _And we would give apologetic looks to everyone around us or in some cases hide our faces so that we wouldn't get very embarrassed by him. A few times we found it amusing but not right now. Sometimes it would be a happy sort of bleat when they announced that it was a certain type of day in the cafeteria and he would disappear in the blink of an eye. Other times it would be out of confusion but this time it was definitely out of irritation.

"Not a donkey! Goat!" He shouted.

My brother stared at him in confusion. "What?"

"I'm a _goat_ from the waist down, okay? _Not_ a donkey!"

"But you just said that it wasn't important!"

"Not important! _Blah-ha-ha_! I could trample you for such an insult! Most satyrs would!"

"Satyrs?" I repeated. "You mean those protectors from Greek legend?"

"The ones from Mr. Brunner's myths?"

I fought off the urge to tell Percy that they weren't actually Mr. Brunner's myths and that they were a very important part of Greek mythology.

"Myths? Legends? Guys, were those three woman across the road a_ myth_? Was Mrs. Dodds a _myth_?"

"Oh, so now you _admit_ that there was a Mrs. Dodds at Yancy Academy!"

"Of course there was."

"But why -"

"The less you both knew the fewer monsters you'd attract and believe me, Annabeth, you have _not_ been making it easy for me. Calling me out on the first day and getting my nerves all riled up. Percy wouldn't have been smart enough to do that!"

"Gee, thanks Grover." Percy said sarcastically.

"That's not what I meant!" Grover snapped. He started fumbling his hands together nervously. "There was only supposed to be one child and now there are two... twins of that ocean dweller... oh why? Why did there have to be two of you? Nobody even _knew_ that there were _twins_! How is this even possible?"

"Buddy, _what_ are you talking about?" Percy asked in confusion.

Grover turned away from the window to look at us. "There was only supposed to be _one_ of you! Not two! One was the thing that started this problem in the first place but now there are two of you and we are all going to die!"

I gave him a confused look. "Grover, what -"

There was a weird bellowing noise outside that made me believe we'd just gone past a cow field or something. Also, that soothing voice was on the winds again and it was arguing but not with a raised voice or anything. I sunk a little lower in my seat and started to relax when Grover's ears perked up and he caught sight of me out of the corner of his eye. He did a double take with wide eyes and I saw pure shock and confusion creep up onto his face.

"Wait, you can _hear_ them?" He asked.

"Hear them? Grover, what are you -"

"Look," Our mom said from the drivers seat. "There's no time to explain things to you two right now but we have to get you to safety. Once you are safe everything will be explained but just not right now."

"Safe?" Percy repeated. "Mom, safe from _what_?"

"Oh, you know, nobody important." Grover said with a miffed look at Percy. I knew he'd never get over that donkey comment if it meant the difference between life and death. "Just death itself and a few of his ghouls who are as confused as I am about there being _two_!"

"Grover!"

"Sorry, Mrs. Jackson." Grover apologized. "I just wish you would have told us -"

"Grover!"

"Alright, alright. You don't think you could drive a bit faster, do you?"

I used everything I knew and my imagination started running wild. Things about monsters and stuff that I just threw aside at the time but really shouldn't have. My brother has _no_ imagination so he was looking at me like a fish with his mouth hanging open. This wasn't a dream, that much was clear since in dreams when you slammed into the side of the car you tended to wake up but I wasn't waking so it couldn't have been a dream. I had never felt like everything around me was something from a nightmare before and I lived with Smelly Gabe and my idiot of a brother named Percy.

Our mom made a hard left and I ended up crushed between the window and Grover. I quickly shoved him off me but he only went a little bit aways because of the speed my mom was driving and the hair-raising turns that happened every five seconds. This time we actually had a bit of a straight road and I looked out of the window at the same time Percy did. The road was narrower than any of the ones I'd ever seen before and it looked like one of those organic farming areas that you heard about in the newspapers.

Farmhouses lined the clearings whilst trees that made up a forest covered the remaining space so that it would have been pretty hard to move off road. There were PICK YOUR OWN STRAWBERRIES signs posted on white fences that my dyslexia somehow didn't manage to mess up for me. I was really confused about that because my dyslexia and Percy's were about the worst you could ever find in the kids of New York. There were lots of hills around and they all had forests that were as large as the one we were going around on them. I started to think that we'd gone into the countryside of New York when I realized that there was hardly any close to where we lived. That just made me more confused.

"Where are we, mom?" I asked.

"Yeah," Percy agreed. "And where are we going?"

"The summer camp I told you both about," Mom answered. "I never wanted to do this. I love you both so much." Her voice was tight and I could tell that she was trying to stay strong for us and not show any fear. "It's the place your father wanted me to send you."

I frowned. "You mean the place you didn't want us to go?"

"Annabeth, please," Mom pleaded. "This is going to be very hard for you two and even harder for me. Please try to understand this. You are both in terrible danger."

"Because of three old ladies knitting strands of blue yarn?"

"Ladies?" Grover snorted. "Those weren't any old ladies. They were the Fates. Can you understand what it means? The fact that they appeared in front of Percy and cut the yarn while he was watching? They would only do that when he's about to... I mean, when someone's about to die."

"Hold up. You just said _he_." I said. "Are you saying my brother's going to die?"

"Say what?" Percy asked from the passenger seat.

"No I didn't. I said _someone_ was about to die. Not Percy."

"I know you didn't say Percy's name but you said _he_ which is a reference to Percy."

"It is not! I said _someone_, Annabeth."

"You did not!"

"I'm going to die?" Percy asked.

"Enough!" Mom raised her voice for the second time in my living memory.

Lightning flashed across the sky and me and Grover let out a yell from the back seats while Percy sunk so low his hair went to the level of the dashboard. A dark figure had been visible for a few seconds in the storm and it had been right in front of us until my mother swerved the Camaro to the right to avoid it and left it behind us in the storm. I sunk down low in my seat just like Percy had afterwards and my ADHD made it so that I couldn't stay still for any longer than I had tried to. It was really hard not to shift around in my seat or jump about like some kind of maniac.

"What the hell was that?" Percy demanded to know.

"Nothing. Mind playing tricks on you. We're almost there." Our mom said evasively. "It's just one more mile. One more mile. Please. One more mile."

"Mom?" I asked worriedly.

She didn't reply and I just started to get more and more worried. There was a lightning strike directly behind us and I jumped a foot in the air and hit my head on the roof of the Camaro. I cursed in Ancient Greek for some reason I didn't know and Grover turned to look from out the rear window to me with bewildered eyes. He seemed really, really confused and it wasn't from everything that was happening around us right then. No. He was really, really confused about me for some reason. Then a second strike of lightning came behind the car again and me, Percy and Grover yelped in surprise.

"Oh no. Gods are angry. Very angry." Grover started muttering to himself. "Only one. Now there are two. Two trying to kill us. Lord Pan, please don't let this happen."

Lord Pan? I repeated in my mind and started wracking my brain for information. That was another Greek god. The god who looked after the wilderness and animals. That only added to my confusion. Aside from the lightning strikes, there was lots of rain and darkness outside. It was basically the kind of weather you found in the countryside of Long Island but I never thought that the countryside was this big. Grover started munching on his fingernails again and I was amazed he didn't bit his fingers off because the car was rocking from side to side constantly and me and Percy kept slamming into the doors and the roof. I had a pretty bad headache after a few minutes.

Percy had gone still in his seat and I was able to lean forwards long enough to give him a good jab in the arm to try and get him to move. Nothing. I guessed he'd gone numb with all the things going around in that tiny brain of his compared to my giant one. That's when I realized. Everything had been _real_. Mrs. Dodds turning into that awful creature was a _real_ thing and not some kind of hallucination like Grover had tried to convince us it was. Those yellow stained fangs and leather coloured wings that had grown out of her body and the way her spine had cracked and snapped as it was happening. I felt like I was going to be sick. In fact, the car ride was so bad that I still can't figure out how I didn't.

I remembered how Mr. Brunner had appeared in the doorway of the gallery and thrown us those weapons he always had on him. Grover had been talking to him one night and they had been talking about Mrs. Dodds. Percy turned around in his seat to look at Grover and I knew he had the same idea as me but we never got to grill him for information. It was like a bomb had gone off. One moment we were in the car driving along and the next it was flying through that air and then it was upside down. I was suspended in the back seat and blinked back the blurriness in my eyes. My ears were ringing but I could still hear things alright.

"Ow." Percy said from the front and I knew that his head had connected with the dashboard. He really did have a big enough head to read it.

"Percy!" Our mother shouted. "Annabeth! Are you two alright?"

"I'm good, mom." Percy replied.

"We're fine." I said from the back. "Grover?" I looked to the side and cringed. "Oh, man..."

You see, the car hadn't really been hit by a bomb but it was the next best thing. The drivers side doors were wedged shut by the mud of the ditch we'd fallen into and the roof was split clean open. That meant that rain was seeping in from all around us. The lightning that had been so close to the back had actually got us this time and we'd been sent straight off the road because of it. I could have been mistaken but I swear I saw the rain change direction so that it was going all around us like some kind of shield. Grover was slumped over in his seat and his seatbelt was about to snap because of his weight on it along with the damage done to the car.

Blood was trickling out of the corner of his mouth and his furry legs were dangling down so that the points of his hooves were just touching the floor. I undid my seatbelt without a second thought but got cuts on my legs when I landed on the cracked and splintered roof. Ignoring them, I rushed over to Grover and shook him hard. There was no signs of life and Percy appeared crawling beside me the next moment. We both shook him for all we were worth and then there was a glimmer of hope.

"Food..." Grover mumbled whilst beginning to drool.

I rolled my eyes. "Even in death that's all he thinks about," I commented before I could stop myself.

Mom had undone her seatbelt too and crawled towards us. "Percy, Annabeth..." She said. "We have to get..." Her voice trailed off as another flash of lightning blasted through the sky and me and Percy looked to our right out the rear window to see what she was looking at. I wished right afterwards that we hadn't.

Mud may have been spattered everywhere but that didn't mean we couldn't see the huge looming figure that was making it's way towards us through the storm. I squinted and could make out that he was holding something over his head. It appeared to be a large blanket but then I realized that blankets weren't water proof and that it had to be some sort of coat. You would need a big coat to fit a guy of that size. My eye sight was still a bit blurry and the guys top half wasn't looking quite right to me because of it. Percy gave me a nudge and we shared a look that said neither of us understood what was going on.

"Children," Our mom said in her serious tone. "Get out of the car. Now."

She slammed against the drivers side door to try and get it open but it wouldn't budge. Percy went for the passenger door whilst I thought for a moment. We were in a car that was upside down with jammed doors, a roof that was impossible to get through and the windshield was buried in mud. However, there was one thing that wasn't stuck. I sucked in a deep breath and kicked the rear window for all I was worth. It shattered and the glass went mostly outside but some went inside and sliced my left leg. None of it got stuck in there but that didn't mean I couldn't have a good swear about it.

"Annabeth?" My mother asked worriedly.

"I'm okay." I replied.

"Children, you both have to run." Mom instructed us. "Can you see the tree? The big one that looks like a Christmas tree?"

"Huh?" Percy asked stupidly and I kicked him with my good leg.

I didn't know why she was asking but I looked anyway. I saw it. It was quite impossible to miss since it was the tallest and widest tree on the hill. It did look like a Chistmas tree but it was much bigger and didn't look like it could ever be placed in a house for Christmas day.

"That's the property line," Mom said.

"Property line?" I repeated.

"Get over the hill and you'll see a big farmhouse in the valley. Just run and call for help. Do not stop until you are at the door."

"Mom, you make it sound like we're going alone." I pointed out.

She went pale and me and Percy lost it.

"Mom! You're coming too!" Percy shouted.

"Don't even try to get out of it!" I added for good measure. "We'll carry Grover and you can lead the way."

The large man was still moving towards us. My eye sight _still_ hadn't cleared up so I couldn't make out any specific details but one thing I could make out was my brother with his mouth hanging open.

"Percy?" I asked.

"His arms are swinging at his sides," Percy said. "He can't be holding something over his head if his arms are at his sides."

I looked back at the figure but still couldn't see it. So I looked back at Percy.

"What?"

"Children, he doesn't want _us_," Mom said. "He's after you. After both of you. And it's partly my fault."

"Your fault?" Percy asked. "But..."

"We don't have time. Children, please."

Percy's face contorted with anger and I got a little mad myself. I was usually very calm around my mother but whenever I don't know something my temper gets riled up no matter who I'm around and that coupled with everything that was going on was enough to make me as mad as Percy. We both launched ourselves out of the car through the broken rear window and dragged Grover out with us. It wasn't hard to get him out since his seatbelt just snapped in two when we both pulled at once. He was actually lighter than I'd expected a boy his age to be and me and Percy both draped his arms over our shoulders.

"Mom, get out of the car!" I said.

"Annabeth -"

"There is no way we are going without you. Now come on!"

The three of us started up the hill through the wet grass and I was limping due to my left leg. It was bleeding but not the full on you-know-you're-gonna-die kind of bleeding. Anyway, it was the stinging from the glass going straight through me that hurt the most and I had to do everything and anything to stop myself from focusing on it. Mom led the way up the hill and we did our best to keep up with her. Percy looked back at whatever it was that was following us and froze on the spot. I almost fell over because of it and my temper flared again when that happened I turned around.

"Will you hurry up, Seaweed Brain?!" I shouted at him.

He turned to look at me. His eyes were wide and his face was pale. "Annabeth, look at it..."

I did just to give him a sharp retort afterwards but the thought died in my head. Blurry eyesight only saves you so much trauma but this time I wasn't very lucky. I could see exactly what Percy had been looking at. The man wasn't a man at all. He had those muscles that you see in all of the wrestling magazines and when those body builders are on TV but magnified so it was ten times as many. Starting at his lower torso, dark hair that was more like fur spread upwards covering every inch of what might have been skin until it reached his head. His head which was actually the head of an overgrown _bull_. I really wished Percy hadn't told me to look.

"Maybe we should go." I suggested.

Percy agreed with me and we both started running at a much faster pace that was fueled by adrenaline to catch up with our mom. Pretty soon we were going at the same pace as her and we were carrying a boy who was half goat with us. I knew exactly what that was and so did Percy. It had been in one of the very first stories that Mr. Brunner told us in Lating Class. But, it's like I said before, my brother isn't very subtle.

"That was the -"

"Son of Pasiphae." Mom said although I didn't think Percy was going to say. "If only I'd known how badly they want you dead."

"Wait, he's a min-"

"Don't say the name," Mom warned him. "Names have power, Percy. We don't want to give him any more of it."

I couldn't agree more. The pine tree was still a good distance away up the hill and we kept going even though we had to repeatedly glance back at the Minotaur at the very bottom of the hill. He was hunched over sniffing the inside of the car. I was inwardly cursing myself for smashing the rear window and getting myself cut bad enough to bleed. I learned at an early age that certain animals can smell a person easier if they are bleeding and I wasn't about to guess that the Minotaur was one of the ones who couldn't. A beast that size would have been able to smell us easily anyway but me bleeding just meant that I was giving him an edge on the situation.

"What's he doing?" Percy asked.

"He's trying to pick up our scent, I think." I replied. "Don't you remember from Mr. Brunner's stories? The min -"

"Annabeth!" Mom interrupted.

"The monster," I corrected. "Has terrible sight and hearing. The only good thing he has is smell and it's way more advanced than any other animal because it's the only sense aside from touch and taste that he has."

"So you're saying that he can _smell_ us even when it's pouring with rain in the middle of a storm?" Percy questioned.

"Exactly." I said. "Though I don't see how he can be real."

"Food..." Grover moaned again.

"Doesn't he ever stop?" I asked, exasperated.

A loud bellowing sound came from behind us and we looked back again to see the Minotaur pick up Smelly Gabe's Camaro and throw it as easily as if it were made of paper down the road we'd been thrown off. It landed in a metallic heap on the soaking wet ground. Me and Percy glanced at one another. Not one little scratch, Gabe had told us. Not one thing to happen to the car. Well, that was another thing that his poker winnings would have to pay for. How were we supposed to explain that the Minotaur itself had chased us and tried to kill us and our best friend? I certainly wasn't going to do it.

"Children," Mom said and we turned around to look at her. "When he sees us, and he will, he's going to charge. You have to wait until the last second and then jump out of the way. Directly sideways, okay? He can't change direction right away if he's charging. Do you understand me?"

We both nodded in unison. "How do you know all of this stuff?" Percy asked. "I thought you hadn't met Grover or Mr. Brunner before."

"I've been worried about being attacked for a long time. The scent was doubley strong because of what I did but I just couldn't leave..." She took a deep breath and I noticed that she was looking at me with guilt in her eyes. "I was selfish. I needed you both near me because I couldn't stand to lose you and you were both so attached to one another."

"Near you? Attached? Mom, what -"

I winced this time as the loud bellow rang out from the bottom of the hill. It didn't take a genius like me to know what had happened. He had caught our scent. Running up the hill was becoming increasingly harder and we were so close to the pine tree now. A few more meters and we'd be there. At the place mom wanted us to be. I almost slipped over on the muddy ground which was way more slippery than it was lower down on the hill. Grover was a dead weight but I wasn't about to give him to the Minotaur on a silver plater. The bull-man himself was racing up the hill and we barely had a few seconds before he'd be right on top of us.

Exhaustion was closing in but I did the most selfless thing I'd ever done that year.

"You have good balance?" I asked Percy.

He nodded. "Yeah."

"Good." I said before flinging Grover's arm off my shoulder and shoving Percy up the hill and to the side.

"Annabeth!" My mom called to me. "Remember to go directly sideways!"

I nodded and turned around to face him. There were only a few seconds to spare before collision when I turned directly to the left and ran for it. I stopped and turned back around to look at him. He had just lowered his head and was rearing up to charge me. Those horns on his head were aimed at my torso and he charged right at me. Completely forgetting about Percy, Grover and my mom. I was hoping that the Minotaur would go right for me instead of them but being caught on my own when I was the most badly injured was not the best idea in the world. Just as I was about to be impaled but two horns I threw myself out of the way and up the hill.

The Minotaur went right past me at top speed just as I collided with the muddy hill once more. My blonde hair was covered in mud by now so you could only see parts of its true colour. I scrambled to my feet and started running up the hill to catch up with my mother, brother and best friend. I chanced a glance over my shoulder and saw that the Minotaur had lost interest in me. Why? Because it was charging my family instead. I got real protective right then and it sort of became a race between my and the bull-man. It was large and beefy and having trouble with the sharp turn so I had the edge for a few moments and managed to catch up with them.

The crest of the hill would have been beautiful in the right weather but with a storm and a monster chasing us I was a little too keen to get off it. There was a farmhouse in the distance just like mom had said there was and the light were able to glow bright enough to pass through the pouring rain even at this distance. Their yellow light was enough to give me hope even if it was half a mile away and across the valley. We might have been able to make it but my brother had a look on his face that said he thought there was no hope. Sometimes being optimistic was a good thing and he just didn't seem to realize that.

I heard the Minotaur behind us and turned to see the one thing that would stay with me for the rest of my life. It had been eyeing my mother, not Percy or Grover, and right then it charged her. I was frozen. Literally frozen to the spot and Percy turned around just as it reached her. When she tried to jump out of the way he stuck out his arm and caught her around the neck. Mom hadn't been able to jump as far as I did and I was going uphill instead of down like she was. Why she was going downhill I had no idea but what I did know was that right then I was well and truly helpless to do anything to help.

"Mom!" Percy shouted whilst I remained frozen. He was frozen to the spot but could still speak. I, on the other hand, could not.

She met our each of our eyes in turn and choked out one word which tore my heart out. "Go."

Then the Minotaur clenched his fist tighter around her neck and she was gone. Just... gone. Like she had dissolved into golden specks of dust and disappeared like those incinerator victims you saw in sci-fi films or when stone was shattered into tiny little pieces. Our mother was gone and there had been nothing we could do to stop it. The Minotaur turned around and started stalking up the hill towards us when my eye sight started to go from blurry to red. Clear red. You can tell that I was angry. Really, really, really angry. First the confusion and then not being able to do anything... I lost my temper three seconds after Percy lost his and dropped Grover to the ground.

Grover woke up upon impact with a tree root and looked around in confusion. "Wh-what?" He spluttered.

That's when he saw me and Percy running forwards towards the Minotaur at the same time. Percy tore off his red jacket and I started making noise to get the Minotaur's attention. Let me just say that I have learned a lot of curse words over the years from Percy, Smelly Gabe and all of the kids at the boarding schools so it wasn't hard to get the Minotaur's attention. It was pretty mad by the time I switched to the less offensive words.

"You're nothing but a piece of ground beef that can walk around you pompous -!"

I never got to finish that sentence because I was cut off by a thunderous roar. I had really annoyed the Minotaur. It charged us right then and there and ignored Grover who was standing a few feet away and was flailing his arms about in the air to try and get its attention. We were backed against the huge pine tree and Percy was waving his red jacket about for the bull to go for. I should really have told him that bulls are colour blind and can't tell the difference between red and white but he had a red jacket and I wasn't about to give him a lecture when there was a monster running at us.

His arms were out at either side to grab us when we tried to jump out the way so I knew we were in trouble. However, as it came closer and was about to hit us Percy went one way and I went the other. It wasn't he went to the side and I went to the other. No. He leapt upwards and landed on the beasts neck whilst I dropped down and slid right under it without getting hit once. Don't ask me how we did it right then but we did and I was really grateful for that. The Minotaur slammed into the tree a moment later and the noise almost popped my already hurting eardrums.

I got to my feet and dived out of the way as the Minotaur started to buck and throw its hind legs in the air. It could have cracked my skull open or knocked all of my teeth out if I had stayed in the way like a stupid person. Percy was holding on for dear life, the Minotaur was going crazy and Grover was yelling at us incoherently. He tried to get closer but was forced to stay where he was by the Minotaur's thrashing around. Then Grover, the idiot that he was, finally got himself noticed by the bull-man and I put myself flat on the ground to avoid getting slammed into by the Minotaur's hind legs.

When I did a flash of lightning appeared really close to me and I moved my head to look in it's direction then froze. There was a woman there. And a man. Watching me. They looked right at me with frowns on their faces and I looked right back with my own identical frown. There was a loud _snap_ behind me and I turned my head back towards Percy and Grover in time to see Percy snap one of the Minotaur's horns right off it's head and get flung through the air. He landed on his back and I could see his head hit a rock as he landed on the ground. There was blood, obviously, and I got to my feet before rushing towards him. I forgot all about the two people who had been behind me and they had disappeared in the next flash of lightning a second later.

I ducked and rolled under the over sized bulls legs as they were used to scrape up dirt and such as the monster prepared to charge Percy. I managed to get out of the way by backing up right against a tree when it charged and I couldn't get a clear view of what was happening. Judging by what I saw from Percy's legs, he had rolled into a kneeling position and then the Minotaur went still and roared in pain. There was another clap of thunder and flash of lightning directly behind me again. I wasn't looking and I missed the two people who were watching me with frowns whom I had seen a moment ago. They disappeared a millisecond later too so even if I had looked back then I wouldn't have been able to see them for long.

The Minotaur began to disintegrate just like Mrs. Dodds had done and not like my mother had done. Mom had gone in a golden light like the angel that she was whilst the Minotaur was going like a monster. It was only fitting in my opinion. Then a second later, the beast had disappeared. It was gone. Dead. The rain was a low drizzle now but the storm was still there only much quieter like it was observing in such a way that it did not want to be noticed. Percy looked awful. His legs were shaking, his hair stained with his own blood and I could smell the stench he was giving off from where I was standing. The look on his face said that the adrenaline had worn off and the grief had kicked in.

Percy started to cry and I ran forwards to him. He held onto me like I was his only life line and my adrenaline started to wear off too. That's when I began to cry aswell, only it was silent. I never made a sound when I cried. I hadn't done it when I was younger and I couldn't even do it then when my mother had been killed by that horrible monster and my brother was breaking down in my arms. Grover ran up to us and fell onto his knees beside Percy and me. He tried to get Percy to calm down but it wasn't working. Nothing he tried would work and I wasn't trying anything since I was crying too but not like Percy was.

It had been a few minutes of crying loudly before Percy passed out from exhaustion against me and I managed to stop the tears from flowing from my own eyes. I looked up at Grover who looked like hell but I knew he didn't look any worse than me or Percy. Our world had just ended. What could be worse?

"Annabeth, we have to get him over the property line." Grover said to me and I nodded once.

I managed to pull myself to my feet with a great deal of effort and take Percy with me, his arm draped over my shoulder. Grover took his other arm and we walked silently over what Grover had called the property line. Grover went through easily and so did Percy but I got stuck like a fly in a cobweb. This blue barrier appeared and I was stuck in it. Grover turned around to look at me and his mouth dropped open. Everything stopped. The rain. The storm. Everything just went silent and still as this golden light started to seep off of me.

Half of it went into the blue barrier but the rest floated off up into the sky. I was hardly focusing on it because I was too shocked to do anything and a second later the pain started. I've never screamed before in my life but I did then. Just once. One scream when the golden light got so bright that you couldn't even see me anymore. I stopped screaming when I collapsed and when I collapsed I passed right through the barrier like it had never been there. I could hear people coming closer but all I felt was pain right then.

A shooting pain right above the corner of my left eyebrow where it had started to bleed. It was like having something engraved into my skin and Grover was still stood there with comically wide eyes and his mouth wide open. The last thing I knew before I passed out was seeing a familiar bearded face and lots of children dressed in orange t-shirts following him.


	6. I Get A Lecture From A Horse

**Hidden Away**

**Disclaimer: I own nothing, all credit goes to the owner/creator of Percy Jackson. **

**Summary: Cursed so that Athena can never sense her, Annabeth is constantly attacked by monsters. At age three she was found in an alleyway by Sally Jackson and grew up as Percy's 'twin' sister. When the lighting bolt is stolen Athena slowly begins to ****realize**** that the demi-god helping Jackson is actually her own daughter. **

_**I Get A Lecture From A Horse, Percy Jackson**_

I was having really strange dreams. Me and Annabeth were getting chased by barnyard animals and my mom was riding a donkey. That was the weirdest one I had. There were other dreams too. A bull the size of the Empire State Building was destroying New York and I was sat on it's shoulder watching the destruction whilst Annabeth sat on one horn reading a book and my mom scolded me for enjoying people dying. There was one really weird dream where there were cows dancing around in tutus and my mom was throwing popcorn at them whilst shouting 'boos'.

A few times I woke up from my exhaustion enduced sleep but then I passed out again. I woke up for the fifth or so time and was about to pass out again when I heard voices and what they said just wouldn't let me pass out anymore.

"... an owl. It's just like... "

"I thought you said there was only one child of the sea god..."

"...quiet. If Annabeth wakes up before we know more about what has happened then she could be in life threatening danger..."

"You mean more than she and her brother and in now..."

"... they don't look like each other, though..."

I forced my eyes to open completely and focused souly on what I had just heard. Annabeth was asleep and she was also in life threatening danger. I didn't even bother to think about what they'd said about me. When my sister is in danger I am not about to pass out so that I am unable to do a thing about it. Thinking about a member of my family being in danger got the adrenaline boost that I was searching for and I felt much better than before. I sighed in relief and lifted my head to look around the place that I was in.

There were plenty of beds around and some of them had other kids in them. They were all wearing orange t-shirts that had the words Camp Half-Blood written on them. I could smell medicine and that let me know that I was in some kind of hospital. My gaze traveled to the right and I saw Grover standing there looking really worried. He was wringing his hands like he always did when he got nervous and he was looking at the person on the bed he was standing beside. I lifted my head up even more to see who it was and went stiff when I saw who it was. Not some kid that I didn't know but my own twin sister. Annabeth.

On her head just above the corner of her left eyebrow that wasn't near her nose was a plaster that looked fresh. It had probably been changed several times. Her hair was being cleaned of mud and what looked like dried blood by an older kid with brown hair. He had on an orange Camp Half-Blood t-shirt as well just like every other kid who wasn't me or Annabeth. I looked at the people who were standing around Annabeth. The older girl who was cleaning her hair looked really confused as he spoke to the others. Grover just looked worried and answered some questions with a shrug of his shoulders. The other person made my jaw drop. It was Mr. Brunner... but... not quite Mr. Brunner. I remembered the stuff that Annabeth told me about Greek legend and came up with a name.

"You're a centaur?" I asked aloud and the three people turned around to look at me in surprise.

"Percy," Grover said, rushing over to my bed side. "You're awake! We thought it would be a few more hours before -"

"Not now, Grover." I cut him off. "I heard what you said about Annabeth being in danger and wouldn't go to sleep again."

"Oh," He looked at the floor awkwardly. "Well, she's alive and healthy if that's what you mean. I'm good too by the way."

I blinked at him and then suddenly felt very guilty. I had been way more concerned about my sisters safety instead of my best friends. Slowly, I pushed myself up using my elbow so that I was sitting instead of lying down.

"Sorry, Grover," I apologized. "I'm just worried about her. She _is_ my sister, after all." I looked around again. "Where am I?"

"You're in the infirmary." Grover said. "We tried to put you in a separate bedroom but every time we tried to move you away from Annabeth you'd get this real bad pained look on your face and we didn't want to hurt you."

"The infirmary..." I repeated. "Why am I in the..." I trailed off as memories started to return to me. The way Grover had found us at Long Island. My mom driving us to the hill in Smelly Gabe's Camaro. The monster, Minotaur, chasing after us. Lightning blasting the car off the road. The Minotaur attacking us. Taking my mother. Killing her. Passing out after defeating the monster. I remembered it all and swung my legs off the bed with a sad expression on my face. "Are you serious?" I asked. "It was all _real_? Our mother is gone?"

Grover nodded sadly. "I'm so sorry, Percy. I was supposed to protect the three of you and then your mother... and then when Annabeth got stuck it was just -"

"Wait," I said. "Stuck. What do you mean stuck?"

He sighed. "Maybe it would be better if Chiron explains it. I don't know that much."

"Who's Chiron?"

The sound of hooves clopping on the floor made me look up and right into the eyes of Mr. Brunner. He was a human from the waist up but after that he was a horse. Horse tail. Horse legs. Horse everything. I felt like my mouth was going to stay permanently open after being left hanging like that so many times.

"Percy..." Mr. Brunner said with a sad look. "I am so very, very sorry for what happened to your mother."

I just nodded in response and kept staring at his bottom half which was a horse. I could not believe what I was seeing. Mr. Brunner, my old Latin teacher, was half horse... a _centaur_. What was going on?

"You are obviously confused about what is going on here," Mr. Brunner continued. "I am not surprised since nothing could ever have been explained to you for your own safety."

At first I just tried to absorb those words in a way that Annabeth would. She'd analyze them and figure out what was going on but I just couldn't do it. My intellect was nothing compared to hers. Speaking of which...

"What happened to Annabeth?" I demanded to know. "She was fine when I passed out. What happened to her?"

Mr. Brunner sighed. "Percy -"

"No. I lost my mother and I'm not losing my sister too. What. Happened. To. Annabeth?"

Grover started wringing his hands nervously again and moved aside so that Mr. Brunner had more room. The infirmary wasn't that big but Mr. Brunner and his horse half were able to stand still easily if there was enough room given to him.

"Percy," Mr. Brunner said with a sigh. "Do you remember all of those stories I told you and Annabeth? About the Greek gods and the monsters that roamed around because of them?"

I nodded very slowly. "Yes," I said. "But what does that have to do with Annabeth?"

"Well, Percy, those stories aren't stories. They're all true. The gods are real and they are alive today." Mr. Brunner explains. "That is why Mrs. Dodds and that creature attacked you both."

"Because a few gods are real?" I asked. "Is this some kind of joke?"

"No, Percy. It's not a joke." Grover said. "Look at Annabeth. How could anything short of something _this big_ have done that to a girl like Annabeth? She doesn't go down for anything."

I looked past Mr. Brunner and straight at my sister. What Grover had said was true. There was nothing that could make Annabeth pass out or get hurt. Even I couldn't do it. She always ended up beating my through one way or another. In our fights she knew exactly what to do. In our exams she knew every single answer. That just made me even more concerned. She would have had to have been hurt pretty badly if it meant she would be unconscious in a bed in an infirmary. I looked back at Mr. Brunner and Grover. Mr. Brunner just looked at Annabeth with sadness and confusion hidden behind that whilst Grover stared at the floor again. He was just as nervous as he had been as a normal kid now that he was a satyr.

"I guess it would have to be something big..." I said. "But that doesn't mean that I'm going to believe you. Those gods can't exist it's impossible and when Annabeth wakes up she'll tell you so and give you all of the reasons why not."

Grover sighed. "He's got that right, sir. She really is very smart. Smarter than most of the Athena cabin."

"Grover," Mr. Brunner said in warning.

"The Athena cabin?" I repeated in puzzlement. "What?"

"Percy, whether you wish to believe this is your choice but know one thing. The gods are real and you and your sister are in grave danger. That beast and Mrs. Dodds were just the beginning. Many more will try to take your lives and your mother's sacrifice will have been for nothing. Do you want that, Percy? To lose the only thing you have left because you would not do something as easy as to believe?"

I opened my mouth to tell him that there was no way I would ever believe that but then closed it again as his words sunk in. If what Mr. Brunner said was true then that meant that my mother had sacrificed herself to get me and Annabeth to safety. She had given herself up to the Minotaur. Given her life to safe both of ours from the monsters that shouldn't have existed and yet did... could I believe this? To save my sisters life and to keep the only member of my family that I had left to me? There was nothing to contest it in my mind.

"No, I don't want to lose her." I admitted. "So, you're saying that everything you ever told me about the Greek gods and the things related to them are real? And that that's the reason my mom is gone and me and my sister are orphans now."

"Orphans?" Mr. Brunner repeated. "No, no, Percy. You do not understand. Do you really believe that these monsters would go after you and Annabeth if you were just like everybody else?"

I frowned. "But... we've only got a few problems. Dyslexia and ADHD. Why would those problems get us attacked by monsters?"

"They are not problems, Percy. They are the greatest gifts that your father bestowed upon you before he had to leave."

"Leave?" I repeated. "You mean when he sailed away and never came back."

Mr. Brunner sighed. "Percy, I know for a fact that your father loved you very much. You would not be alive today if that were not true and neither would Annabeth."

"How can you know all of this?" I asked. "Does being a centaur automatically mean you know everything about me and my sister?"

Grover nudged my shoulder. "I know you're upset because you lost your mother, Percy, but everything we are saying is true. You can't just be mad and upset because of it when you have a sister depending on you. For all we know, she might be younger than you by a few minutes or hours. You've got to be strong for her, Percy."

I let out a long breath. "Okay... okay... I can do this," I said. "So, the Greek gods and everything to do with them are real. Those monsters want to kill me and Annabeth for a reason I don't know yet. Why do they want to kill us?"

"Percy, do you remember the stories I told you of Hercules and Theseus?"

"Yes."

"Well, they weren't just normal mortals. They were demi-gods. Half mortal, half god. They were attacked by monsters because of who they were and it is who you are too. You and Annabeth."

"Demi-gods?" I repeated. "You're saying that we are demi-gods?"

"That is correct."

"We're... but... then who... our father was a god?" I asked.

Mr. Brunner nodded. "He was a god. As am I." He said. "Let me introduce myself properly. My name is Chiron."

"One of the children of Kronos? Annabeth always bugged me to get your name right." I admitted.

Mr. Brunner, or Chiron, gave a small smile. "I would hope she did. Spelling my name wrong would be considered most offensive, as would saying it wrong."

"Right..." I said slowly. "So... we are demi-gods and our father is a god?"

"Yes."

I shook my head slowly. "If our father is a god then why didn't he help when our mother was taken? Why didn't he try to stop it?"

"Things don't work that way, Percy." Grover said. "The gods can't help with everything. Anyway, how are you feeling? With all of this and your health aswell."

"I don't feel ill if that's what you mean," I replied. "Just confused and a little hungry. When's Annabeth going to wake up? I know she got beaten up worse than me but that was to help us escape and she didn't look so bad before I passed out."

"Not so bad?" Grover repeated. "From what you could see with her clothes hiding things then no it probably wouldn't have. Percy, her left leg was cut up by glass that would have left scars if we hadn't treated it and she was suffering from worse exhaustion that you when we brought her in. Not to mention what happened on the property line -"

"Grover," Chiron warned. "Percy, your sister passed out when she crossed the property line. That is the summary of what happened and the answer to your question. She was helping to carry you when it happened."

I felt even guiltier than I did when I didn't ask Grover if he was okay. After my adrenaline rush had worn off I'd collapsed with grief and started to cry. I could remember Annabeth running to me and holding me whilst I cried but then I had passed out. That meant that she had remained awake and carried me to the place where mom had said it was safe before she herself had passed out. I knew then that I owed her big time and to help her out I had to try and understand everything that was going on. I had to accept that the gods were real and that me and Annabeth were demi-gods to make sure that I was there for her when she woke up and not the other way around. Having my sister wake up and then try to look after me was not what I wanted to happen. It couldn't happen.

Running a hand through my hair, I sighed. "Demi-gods..." I said. It sounded weird coming from my mouth. "I doubt anyone would have guessed that that's what we are."

Grover gave me a sad smile, as did Chiron. "So you believe now Percy?" Grover asked.

"I'm not saying I _completely_ believe," I said. "But for Annabeth's sake I'm willing to believe that the gods are real and that we're demi-gods who get attacked by monsters."

Chiron's smile then became much wider and happier. "Excellent," He said. "I at first believed that it would take days to explain this to you but any time that we can save is good. Now, I am assuming you would like to know where you are and not just in the infirmary."

I nodded. I was wondering where I was aside from being in the infirmary. It never hurt to know where I was especially when Annabeth was lying on a bed unconscious.

"You are at Camp Half-Blood." Chiron said. "You have been unconscious for just over two days."

"Camp Half-Blood..." I repeated. "Like half-blood as in half human and half god."

"Exactly. Now, I believe Grover went to the top of the hill to retrieve an object for you." Chiron turned towards him. "Grover?"

Grover stooped down at the end of my bed and pulled up a box. I found myself growing curious as he handed it to me.

"I went to the top of the hill a day ago, Percy. After they made sure that Annabeth was... I mean, after they made sure that the both of you were okay." He said.

I glared at him. "Grover, if it was Annabeth who was in trouble and not me then you can say it. If what you told me is true then she's fine now and I don't like being lied to when things are falling apart around me."

"Sorry, Percy. We don't want to make you stressed or anything. It could become too much for you to handle." Grover apologized.

"Relax, Grover. What did you go to the top of the hill for?"

"Well, I knew you'd want something to remember how you avenged your mother so I got you the horn. The one you snapped off of the creature."

I opened the box and sure enough the horn was in there. It was just as I remembered with the rugged base from where I'd snapped it off and stained from years of use so that it's normal white colour had faded.

"Thanks, Grover." I said.

"No problem." Grover replied.

"Percy, would you like a tour?" Chiron asked.

"Um," I looked uneasily at Annabeth. "I don't know, Chiron. I don't want to not be here when she wakes up."

Chiron gave me a warm smile. "It will be fine, Percy. We will be notified if she begins to wake and then you can be here the very next minute. I doubt that Annabeth will have any troubles if she is left alone for one minute."

I still felt uneasy about leaving my sister in the infirmary but if I knew Annabeth then she would be able to take care of herself until I got back. I nodded as an answer and Chiron led me out of the infirmary. The Minotaur horn stayed in my hand since I didn't have a pocket big enough to fit it into and every time I looked at it I felt as if mom was there with me.

The first thing that Chiron wanted to show me was the Big House and the person named Mr. D. Chiron said that Mr. D was the one who ran the camp and that he made all of the decisions for the campers. Mr. D was actually the Greek god named Dionysus and when I met him he was like an alcoholic who had just gone a whole day without a drink. I learned later on from Chiron that he had been forbidden to drink wine by Zeus as a punishment and that any amount of years being unable to drink was like a day to an immortal god like him. I couldn't say I didn't understand thanks to Smelly Gabe and his crew.

We started to walk around and some of the kids started to notice the Minotaur's horn in my hand. They were whispering to one another but I couldn't hear them. I was too busy listening to Chiron and thinking of how I was going to tell Annabeth all of this stuff about the Greek gods being real. She was probably going to throw so many statistics in my face I'd be rendered speechless a hundred times before I finally managed to explain things to her. I was half expecting for a camper to run up to us and say that she was awake or just waking up but no-one came by so I got a lot more time to run over my explanation in my head. I hoped it would be worthy of her standards.

Chiron showed me the strawberry fields where another satyr who was older than Grover was playing his pipes and leading bugs away from the plants like they were a marching band or something. We went to many different places after that. The woods were something that Chiron had been wanting to show me so we went there first. I could see just how big the forest was once I got there. It had to have taken up at least half the valley and possibly even more. The trees in there were so tall and thick that you could hardly see in and it looked like only those eco-lovers would be brave enough to go in.

"These woods are stocked. You may try your luck if you want to but you must go armed." He said.

"Stocked?" I asked. "With what? And what do you mean by armed? Armed with what?"

"You will see, Percy." Chiron said. "We have our Capture the flag game on Friday night. Do you and Annabeth have your own weapons and armour?"

I blinked at him. "What?"

"No, I don't suppose either of you have ever held a sword aside from in my Latin classes."

Swords and armour made it sound like there was some kind of life threatening danger involved like there was back in the olden days. Though if I was honest, against a bunch of campers, I really doubted that Annabeth would need much more than a knife to win in a fight like that.

Chiron chuckled. "Yes, from what I have seen your sister is quite the fighter." He commented.

I realized that I had just said that out loud and blushed before I could help myself. Stupid mouth moving of it's own accord.

We visited every place in the camp that Chiron thought I needed to see. He took me to see the archery range, the lake which campers used for canoeing, the stables (which smelt almost as bad as Smelly Gabe) and the arena where they were supposed to hold fights involving a sword and spear every weekend. I thought it would have all been brilliant if my mom hadn't talked about it the way she did. I knew there was a catch. There was always a catch with places like these and it was either leaving early or a poor choice of food or something else that just made it so much less like-able.

"Oh, here's the mess hall." Chiron said and pointed towards and outdoor pavilion which had pillars from the Grecian era coloured white and was on a hill where you could see the forest and the ocean.

There were a dozen picnic tables inside. Twelve that I counted. There was no roof and no walls.

"There's no roof," I pointed out. "What if it rains and you have nowhere to go?"

Chiron gave me an odd look. "A person needs to eat, Percy." He said.

I didn't know whether or not to drop the subject. Annabeth wouldn't have until she'd learned what the answer was and then she would tell me so I wasn't being a total idiot. But now she was in the infirmary and I had nobody to help me out in these tough situations. What's more, I got told by Grover and Chiron that _I_ had to step up and be the head of my family now which meant looking after her instead of the other way around. Why did life have to be so difficult when it was supposed to be so easy?

The final item of the tour was the cabins. They were in a U shape and there were twelve of them for the twelve gods on the Olympian council... no, there were... _thirteen_? Why were there thirteen cabins?

"Chiron," I said. "Why are there thirteen cabins? Annabeth told me that there were only twelve major gods and you said one cabin for each god on Olympus so why are there thirteen?"

Chiron sighed. "Do you see that cabin, Percy?" He gestured to a cabin that had an owl crest above it's door and kids inside of it. The doors were open and there were work notes everywhere.

"Yes." I replied.

"That is the Athena cabin," Chiron said. "It was supposed to be the _only_ Athena cabin until this next one was built." He gestured to one that was directly opposite it.

"Why are there two cabins?" I asked. "Does Athena have lots of children?"

Chiron shook his head. "No, Percy. There was a terrible tragedy twelve years ago between the gods and..." A look of sadness crossed his face. "A child went missing. That was all myself and Dionysus were allowed to know. We were also told that a new cabin would be built for that child and that child only when they were found and they would live under the protection of Athena here at camp forever. It is the most dedication a god has ever shown openly to a child for a long time. Nobody can get close to the cabin unless the child who lies there allows it."

"But how did a child go missing?" I questioned. "The gods are, well, _the gods_. How could they not find out where the child went? Shouldn't Athena have been able to find out?"

Chiron just shook his head once more. "We do not know, Percy. No-one was told the whole story apart from Athena herself, Zeus and two other gods. Apollo and Ares. I would assume that the problem had something to do with the god of war himself."

The cabins were set out like this. Bronze numbers above the door with odds on the left and evens on the right. The first Athena cabin was Number 6# whilst the other one, being directly opposite, got the odd number of Number 7#. The U was of equal distance on all sides thanks to the thirteen different cabins and Number 1# was right at the head of it all. All the cabins faced inwards to a commons area that might have been the size of a regular soccer field. I couldn't tell from where I was. There were statues dotted around and some sorted into an arrangement that didn't look all that bad if I was honest.

None of the cabins looked the same. Not even the two Athena cabins did. Number 4# had vines going up it's walls and a roof that was made of grass and every other plant that came with it. Number 9# even had smoke stacks coming out of it's roof. The first Athena cabin was a blue and gold building with white curtains and a large owl carved above the doorway. I could just about see a large area of bookcases, like a library, inside and plenty of workspace though it was all filled up with almost a dozen campers who were moving about inside. The second Athena cabin looked different from all the others. I knew right then that Athena cared a hell of a lot more about the child that had gone missing than the others because this cabin looked _magnificent_.

It was taller than the other cabins and had to be at least two stories with a possible attic above that. There was a small balcony made of smooth wood that had symbols carved into it and double doors with stained glass windows that showed identical images of owls leading onto it. The front door at the bottom had a set of two small steps leading up to it and there was only one door as opposed to the double doors by the balcony. There was an owl carved above that door just like the one on the first Athena cabin but this one was extremely detailed and had colour on it that hadn't faded one bit. An area of decking surrounded the entire cabin and had deck chairs and even one hammock on it. There were windows through which you could see white curtains with blue owls decorating them hiding the inside from view.

My opinion was that the cabin was brilliant.

There were kids sat on some of the stone benches of the commons area and they were all looking at it with awe. I could even spot some of the kids in the first Athena cabin giving it jealous glances like they had a personal vendetta against whoever was going to occupy it later on. To tie it all together, there was a large blue shield surrounding the cabin and landing a few meters away from the decking and steps to the front door. I didn't need to be Annabeth to know what it was for. Keeping people out. One camper threw a stone at it and it bounced right off and left a crack in the stone right beside that campers head on the rebound.

"The missing child must be very special," I said.

Chiron nodded sadly. "For Athena to make something that much better than the first cabin and all for one child, it would have to be. Sometimes I hope that the child never arrives here."

"Why?" I asked.

"Look around you, Percy. Either the campers are awed by this cabin or they are jealous of it. For example, the entire Ares cabin have sworn to get whoever this cabin was built for and kill them with a sword on a chopping block. Athena is the goddess of wisdom so she must have known it would evoke this reaction." He sighed. "Whatever happened on Olympus that day was enough to drive her to vengeance upon all campers here at Camp Half-Blood. I can only imagine how much losing that child has made her care for it."

"How does that work?"

Chiron turned to look at me. "Ever lose a friend Percy? Or a treasured object perhaps? Once you find it again you hold on and you never let it out of your sight. You do everything in your power to ensure that it stays with you. Imagine losing a child. The same thing happens in that situation aswell. Twelve years Athena has searched and nothing. Can you imagine how much she must care for that child?"

I nodded with a sad look on my own face. "I can," I said. "What about her other children? Didn't she share her affections with any of the ones she had after that child went missing."

"There were no more, Percy." Chiron admitted. "She swore off children until her missing one is found. Her own children mourn for the loss of their brother or sister on the anniversary of their disappearance every year. You will notice that they look sad today. That is because another anniversary is coming up and their spirits are low."

We stopped talking about Cabin 7# then. The cabin number that had been assigned to the new cabin once it had been built. Each of the cabins looked different. We started at Cabin 1# and made our way around. Cabin 3# really caught my attention and before Chiron could stop me I stuck my head in the door. It smelled of the salty sea air at Montauk that I loved so much. I could hardly believe it was the exact same smell but there it was. Chiron steered me away from that cabin and we kept walking.

Cabin 5# had a really nasty paint job where it looked like red paint had just been thrown on carelessly. Barbed wire lined the top and a stuffed boars head was above the door. Inside were the most aggressive looking kids I've ever seen and they were all arguing and fighting one another with their fists. It looked like Smelly Gabe's hovel compared to the magnificent Cabin 7# beside it. One of the bigger girls gave me a sneer as we went past and I made the mistake of looking at Cabin 7# and back again with a comparative look on my face. She shouted a curse at me and thunder flared in the sky somewhere. I wasn't sure why but I decided never to do that again.

We continued walking and were looking at all the other cabins for a long while before we started to walk towards a specific one at the end.

"Chiron," I said. "Where are all the other centaurs? If you're here then shouldn't there be some of them nearby too?"

"I am afraid not, Percy." Chiron said. "My kind tend to run wild and free. It is the life they prefer and I will not deter them from it."

I didn't ask any questions and soon we reached the cabin that we had been walking towards. The bronze number _11_ was above the door and it looked like it might fall off at any second. This cabin looked by far to be the oldest. Paint was peeling off it and it looked like a regular summer cabin. In fact, if you compared it to Cabin 7# then you could see how old it was. It wasn't as bad as Cabin 5# though and that was a good thing. The inside was packed to the brim with kids. Sleeping bags were strewn out across the floor and bunk beds were piled into the corners. It was then that I learned the true definition of overcrowding.

A boy with blonde hair and grey eyes was sat on the doorstep reading a book. I didn't know why but for some reason I was reminded of Annabeth. She was always like that with her nose in a book and being completely oblivious to the world around her. Although, this kid wasn't oblivious to the world around him since he looked up the moment we got close and started sizing me up. I just waited for things to pass. He bowed to Chiron and introduced himself. His name was Malcolm and he was a child of Athena. He was also in charge of the entire Athena cabin. I asked him if he was in charge of the other cabin too and his face turned stony.

"No," He said though his voice was tight. "The person who is in charge of that cabin would be the only person who lives there and we don't know who that it. In fact, my mother loves them _so much_ that they also have the choice of being in charge of the original cabin too."

I realized I'd made a mistake by bringing that up but I was saved by Chiron. Then I realized he was sending me into the jaws of death by saying he had to leave me with Malcolm who I was certain had a permanent grudge against me. He stood up from the doorstep and left his book carelessly on the floor as he told me to follow him without even bothering to look at me. I really had struck a nerve by bringing up _that cabin_ and I knew never to do it again. Not for anyone but Annabeth since she was my sister and I knew she'd agree with me on this one. A cabin was no cause for a war.

Everyone in the cabin, or the Hermes cabin as it was actually called, was nice to me in their own sort of way. I was 'undetermined' and when I asked what that meant I just had to ask a follow up question.

"Does that mean my sister is undetermined too?" I asked and gasps came from everywhere in the room.

"You... you have a _sister_?" One girl asked. "So she's not a demi-god then... just a half-sister who's mortal and -"

"She's my twin." I cut her off and everyone gasped again. I looked around with a frown. "Okay, what is so bad about that? Annabeth's never hurt anyone who doesn't deserve it, apart from me," I added. "So why is everybody so surprised to know that she exists?"

"Because there's only supposed to be one -"

"Enough." A boy cut off the girl who had been trying to explain. He was older than the rest and about nineteen years old if I had to guess. He looked pretty cool. He wore sandals on his feet and he was tall and muscular like the cooler kids at Yancy Academy and around his neck was a necklace with five clay beads on it. Each had a different image on it. He wore a tank top that was orange and had this one long white scar that traveled down his face from his right eye to his jaw. Not that bad if I had to make an overall statement.

"To answer your previous question, Percy, if your sister - Annabeth was it? - had been claimed then you would have been too. You are both twins and therefore claiming one child would automatically claim the other. Where is your sister anyway? I think we should all see the girl that we never knew existed."

"She's in the infirmary," I said. "She gave her own safety to help me."

The boy nodded in understanding. "Sounds like a nice kid. Now, my name is Luke and I am yours and Annabeth's counselor." He introduced himself. "For now, at least."

"For now?"

"Until your godly parent claims you. Then the two of you will go and live in those cabins and have other counselors. Naturally, we take in all the visitors and undetermined ones as Hermes is the god of travelers."

"Undetermined ones..." I said. "How long does it take for you to get determined?"

All the campers around me burst out laughing, even Malcolm who I was sure hated me and was just loving the opportunity to laugh at the new kid. I looked around for a moment before having the strangest thought about Annabeth being in some kind of trouble and walked right out. A few stopped laughing and gave me odd looks as I went with this concerned expression on my face. Others yelled, "Where are young going?" but I kept walking. I wanted to see my sister right then and I had no idea why but I just did. I also knew that I wasn't going to mention her name to anyone anymore.

I got stopped before I could get far by a beefy girl who was surrounded by her friends. As best I could, I stuffed the Minotaur horn into my pocket and sized them up. I was going to be flattened.

"Look what we have here," The girl said with a sneer. "A newbie. We have a little initiation ceremony for people like you."

I remembered something Annabeth had told me when we were younger. _"If there's one thing the bullies hate, it's newbies who don't know the pecking order. They'll say there's an initiation ceremony and the next thing you know you're being beaten senseless." _That was enough for me to know.

Before I could do anything, the beefy girl grabbed my hair and started pulling me towards the toilets. Her friends followed behind and I knew I was done for. She kicked open the door and dragged me over to one of the toilets in one of the cubicles. When she tried to shove my head in it I put my hands out to stop myself and held firm. The girl shoved me to try and get me in but then I felt this strange sensation in my gut. The next thing I knew water had soared out of the toilet and was spraying right in the girl's face. She stumbled backwards and spluttered as the toilet water attacked her.

Her friends rushed forwards to help but then the other six cubicle doors exploded open and water flew out of them and started attacking them all. The door to the toilets was thrown open and all the kids were forced out of it. The entire room had been flooded and everything was soaking except for me. I was staring down at myself and gaping. Around my feet was a dry circle and not one part of me was soaked. Not the hair on my head or the fabric of my clothes. I was completely stunned.

Getting over my shock, I moved to the door to see what had happened to the campers who had tried to stick my head in the toilet. The were all soaked and their hair was stuck to their faces whilst their clothes were dripping wet and they all looked like drowned cats. Malcolm was stood there looking at them with raised eyebrows and then he caught sight of me and they lowered into a frown. He began sizing me up again but I was more interested in the beefy girl who had just gotten to her feet.

"You are so dead newbie!" She screamed. "You and your freak of a sister!"

I had no idea how she knew about Annabeth but when she started running in one direction with a few kids following her I realized where they were going. The infirmary. They were going to get Annabeth.


	7. I Beat Up Some Campers

**Hidden Away**

**Disclaimer: I own nothing, all credit goes to the owner/creator of Percy Jackson. **

**Summary: Cursed so that Athena can never sense her, Annabeth is constantly attacked by monsters. At age three she was found in an alleyway by Sally Jackson and grew up as Percy's 'twin' sister. When the lighting bolt is stolen Athena slowly begins to ****realize**** that the demi-god helping Jackson is actually her own daughter. **

_**I Beat Up Some Campers, Annabeth Jackson (Chase)**_

I was woken by a woman's voice shouting in my head. _Annabeth, wake up! _It wasn't the most ideal way in the world to wake up but I was glad for it. Hovering above my face was a dagger that was about to come down and the adrenaline started pumping. I rolled off the bed towards the person who had the knife and tripped them over. The dagger rolled under the bed and I counted how many attackers there were. Five. Five large, beefy people attacking me and they were all kids who were slightly older than I was. I was taking in every single detail and I used a roundhouse kick to disarm the second person.

After that I just went right into attack mode. They ended up being on the defensive and judging by the looks on their faces they were really surprised by how well I was fighting. I did wake up about twenty seconds ago. I kicked and punched and ducked and rolled and managed to, by some miracle, perform a backflip over one of the kids as the fight led us outside. A crowd gathered and made a sound of awe when I did it but I didn't care. First of all I wanted to beat these kids into the ground and then I wanted to find my brother and make him pay for letting something like this happen to me.

The crowd got bigger and I got better at fighting. I had an entire strategy planned out in my head and every time I picked up one of theirs it would change to find a way around it. In the space of thirty seconds I had knocked all five of the kids on their butts and another thirty seconds later I was throwing the last one over my shoulder so they landed on the ground with the other four and were either unconscious or just barely conscious. The adrenaline started to wear off slowly once I knew that the danger had passed but what really made it go down was when I heard a familiar voice from somewhere in the crowd.

"Annabeth!" It was Percy and he managed to get to the front with a boy with blonde hair and grey eyes with him. The kid looked from me to the five kids lying on the floor and his eyebrows went into his hair line. It was obvious that he was impressed. "Oh, Annabeth, are you okay?"

"I'm fine," I said. "Where the hell have you been? I know we're twins and all but you really are the stupidest person I have ever met."

"Ah, so this is the Annabeth that you were talking about." A boy who was wearing sandals, a leather bracelet with beads on it and had a large white scar on his face said as he stepped forwards. "I thought you were exaggerating Percy. Turns out you weren't."

"Who are you?" I asked.

"Luke Castellan." He replied. "Son of Hermes. And you are?"

I thought that a bit stupid since he already knew my first name and that I was Percy's twin but I answered anyway. "Annabeth Jackson." I said and started sizing him up. He looked like the kind of person I could trip up easily. Then I realized he'd just said he was the son of _Hermes_ and I looked directly at Percy with an accusing stare. "What. Have. You. Done?"

He blinked at me. "Huh?"

"Percy, I'm not an idiot. Either those campers pick on kids who are sleeping or _you _did something to rile them up. Which was it?"

He suddenly looked incredibly guilty and both the blonde haired boy who had followed him and Luke Castellan looked very amused.

"I... I... I tried to stop them?" He offered weakly and I glared at him.

"_Percy_," I said warningly.

The kids around us started to laugh.

"Okay, okay, I'll tell you. They wanted to dunk my head in the toilet because I'm a newbie and then something weird happened with the water and the next thing I know they're running over here to beat you up because they couldn't beat up me." He explained.

My eyebrows rose. "Percy, beating you up is the easiest thing in the world. How did five kids not manage to do it?"

"I'm incredibly lucky?"

I kicked him in the shin and he yelped in pain. He knelt down, clutching his knee and the kids started to laugh even harder. I had no idea where I was but then the crowd started to disperse and I could hear a deep voice shouting at them to move aside. What I saw next made me really confused. Mr. Brunner appeared but it wasn't him. The Mr. Brunner I knew was stuck in a wheelchair at Yancy Academy grading papers but this Mr. Brunner had a horses body from the waist and was walking through the crowd with ease. He looked at the five kids on the ground, then at Percy rubbing his shin and back up to me with that amused and exasperated look that he always gave me.

This was definitely Mr. Brunner.

"I take it you are expecting an explanation of where you are, Annabeth?" He asked with a small smile.

The blonde haired boy with grey eyes stopped laughing and frowned. "Wait, you mean she doesn't know about this and she was still able to..." He trailed off and looked at the five kids on the ground again. Then he got this really impressed look on his face. "I think you should be on my team in Capture the flag."

"Capture the flag?" I repeated with my own frown.

"Let us explain things to you," Mr. Brunner said. "Luke, are you going to stay or...?"

The boy shook his head. "I've been wondering who Percy's twin is ever since he mentioned her and my cabin isn't going anywhere. I can stick around a bit longer."

Mr. Brunner inclined his head in an understanding manner. "Let's go back inside the infirmary. I believe that your leg has begun to bleed again, Annabeth."

I looked down and realized that he was telling the truth. I hadn't even noticed it before but the bottom portion of my left leg was bandaged and a small dot of the white bandage had been stained red and it was slowly growing bigger. Percy hurried up from his kneeling position and helped me get back inside the infirmary as I had a limp when I walked. My leg stung every time I put weight on it and I held back the winces because I never winced for anything. Percy helped me over to the bed I'd previously been sleeping on and behind me Luke stooped down to pick up the dagger that I'd knocked out of a girls hand. His eyebrows went up.

"I must say I'm impressed, Annabeth." He said. "Must have been one hell of a surprise for you when the peace and quiet was disrupted and they came in here and jumped at you."

"Actually I was asleep," I admitted as I sat down on the bed. Luke's comments about how impressed he was did nothing for me. Growing up with Percy meant I got those a lot and I didn't much care for them anymore.

"I always said you could kill someone in your sleep," Percy mumbled and I elbowed him hard in the ribs. He let out an _oof!_ and fell down onto the bed beside me. "Damn it, Annabeth. You've been awake less than five minutes and you've already managed to hit me twice."

"It's not exactly a hard thing to do, Percy." I said.

My brother glared at me.

"Alright, alright, let's have no more of that." Mr. Brunner said as he came inside behind us. "You will have plenty of time for sibling rivalry later. But now we must explain things to you Annabeth."

"You mean the reason you never told us you're a centaur?" I asked.

He nodded. "Precisely." He said. "Annabeth, do you remember all of those stories about Ancient Greece that I told you and Percy in my Latin classes?"

"Yes," I replied.

"Well, as I explained to Percy, they aren't stories. They are real. The gods are alive and the monsters that are around because of them are real too." He explained.

I stared at him blankly. "Real?" I repeated. "You mean to say that their children are real too?"

Percy gave me an odd look. "How do you know all these things? I never told you."

I rolled my eyes. "Percy I think it's fairly obvious that if the gods and the monsters they created are real that demi-gods are real too."

"Wow, that's a smart kid right there, Chiron." The blonde haired kid said to Mr. Brunner. "If she wasn't Percy's twin I'd think she could be -"

"Well she's not Malcolm." Mr. Brunner said. "We would know by now and she _is_ twelve years old. Do you know what that would mean?"

The boy, Malcolm, suddenly had a guarded expression on his face. "Of course, sir. It can't be."

I had no idea what they were talking about but I did pick up on one thing. "Your name is Chiron?" I asked. "Like the trainer of heroes who was granted immortality?"

Mr. Brunner nodded. "Yes, that is correct."

"Do you believe all of this already?" Percy questioned. "Because it took me a long while to understand it."

"You'd need to with a tiny brain like yours Percy," I said with a cocky smirk.

Percy opened his mouth to retort but was interrupted by Luke coughing into his hand.

"I don't think there's any doubting that they're siblings, Chiron. Just look at their sibling rivalry. I don't have that with any of my half brothers and sisters." He said.

Chrion nodded. "I know, Luke. It's rather amusing if I'm honest."

"Very amusing," Malcolm agreed. "It's great to see Percy Jackson taken down a few pegs by his own sister."

I gave Percy an exasperated look. "I knew you'd done something," I grumbled.

"Shut up," He grumbled back.

"Annabeth do you believe that the gods are real and that demi-gods themselves are real?" Chiron asked.

I thought for a moment. Me, Percy and Grover had been fighting a Minotaur and that was a monster from Ancient Greece that was defeated by a demi-god. Then there was our mother... I put that thought way at the back of my mind. I was supposed to be looking after the idiot who couldn't do it himself so I shouldn't be breaking down about it.

"Yes," I replied.

"Well then, what would you say if I said that both you and Percy are demi-gods?"

That was a no brainer. "I'd say that Percy is a very weak demi-god."

"Hey!" Percy shouted.

"Oh come on, Percy. I couldn't miss the opportunity."

"You little -"

"I can see that you do not need much convincing," Chrion cut in. "For the next few days you will have to sleep in the infirmary, Annabeth. You should be well enough to fight in time for the Capture the flag game on Friday night if we are lucky. The place you are in is called Camp Half-Blood and when you get out of the infirmary you will be staying in the Hermes cabin. Luke here will be your counselor until your godly parent claims you and then you will move to that cabin. Understood?"

I nodded. "Got it."

"You got all of that so quickly?" Percy asked. "How?"

I sighed dramatically. "Well Percy, people have this thing called a _brain_," I said sarcastically. "And it means that idiots like you -"

"I got it, Annabeth. You're smarter than me." Percy said with a roll of his eyes. "You could have just said so."

"I didn't think you'd understand."

"You did not -!"

"Why doesn't Percy go with Malcolm to the armoury and I'll give Annabeth a tour of the camp?" Luke suggested.

"_Or_ we could do that the other way around," Malcolm said. "He is staying in your cabin after all and you wouldn't want him to get hurt would you?"

"Are you saying that you won't look after him?"

"I'm saying that someone who speaks so insensitively about Cabin 7# has no place around me."

Percy had a guilty look on his face. "What's Cabin 7#?" I asked before he could stop me and Malcolm's face became stony and his eyes narrowed.

"It's the second Athena cabin." He said.

"Athena cabin?"

"The place where all of Athena's children stay," He explained. "One of her children went missing and she built another cabin just for them that was better than any other cabin and directly across from ours. Nobody except for that person can get inside."

I frowned. "I don't see how that's such a bad thing if she cares about her child enough to build them their own cabin."

Malcolm's eyes narrowed even more. "It's a bad thing because it shows that she cares more about that child than she cares about us."

"Well none of _you_ have ever gone missing have you?" I asked. "Athena would have always known where you were and when you lose something you like it even more once you find it. Besides, it's just a cabin with a symbolic meaning that's supposed to be good for all her other children."

"I hardly think -"

"Wait," Chiron interrupted. "Luke how about you take Percy to the armoury now. This is going to become a very heated debate."

Luke nodded in understanding. "I know what you mean, Chiron. Let's go Percy. Things aren't going to get any prettier."

Once they had left the room and Chiron had excused himself to return to his archery class me and Malcolm started to argue. We argued for a long time even though it was more of a loud debate than anything else. He never once made me speechless as I searched for the answer but I did it to him several times. Slowly, the debate started to go down to a normal noise level and it finished with me making Malcolm speechless _again_. He got this impressed look on his face and started to explain things about Camp Half-Blood. I knew that he wasn't going to bring up much about Cabin 7# anymore so I just listened to everything he had to say.

I liked the sound of the Athena kids. Malcolm was their head counselor. They spent all of their time expanding their brains by reading things from the library in their cabin, planning out battle strategies or doing whatever they wanted which usually involved some kind of educational thing. I was liking Camp Half-Blood already. Malcolm told me which kids to avoid and about the five who I'd beaten up. They were from the Ares cabin and the girl who had been leading them was named Clarisse and she was best to be avoided if you couldn't handle her. Then he said that I obviously _could_ handle her and to just make sure she never caught me by surprise.

There were lots of things to do at Camp Half-Blood. Malcolm said that there was training all the time where kids learned to speak in Ancient Greek and fight with all sorts of weapons against monsters. I then asked what he had meant by him wanting me on his team in Capture the flag on Friday night. The cabins each chose their sides and fought against each other until one team got the enemies flag and got it back to their own one. I realized that it was kind of like that games me and Percy had used to play when we were younger and asked which cabins were on Malcolm's team. He said the names of a few gods and then one that made me rethink being on his team.

"... the Ares cabin are too. When our two cabins are together we never get beat." He said.

"But the Hermes cabin is on the other team?" I asked.

Malcolm nodded. "Most in there can't use a sword right and we don't want them on our team."

"And yet me and Percy are staying in the Hermes cabin," I pointed out. "If you don't want Percy on your team then I really can't be there either. The Ares cabin will hate us both by now and there is no way I am leaving him to get beaten up by a bunch of oafs. No offence to the other cabins obviously."

"None taken," Malcolm said. "You must really love your brother to stay on his side after everything."

I frowned. "What do you mean 'after everything'?"

"Nobody told you?"

"Told me what?"

Malcolm sighed. "Well, some of us here at camp went on a field trip to Olympus on the winter solstice. The gods started acting really strange. We didn't get told anything other than something really important had been stolen."

"How could someone steal something from the gods?" I asked.

"Hermes did it as a baby," He said. "Stole Apollo's chariot. I don't know if anyone below a really powerful demi-god could have done it and they'd have to know where things on Olympus to get them. It might have been a god helping someone or something else. I'm not really sure."

I thought that was a little odd but decided to leave it. After a few more discussions I felt a sharp pain in my leg and looked down at it. I realized that we had completely forgotten about my leg bleeding again and we changed the bandages and cleaned it up a moment later. Malcolm explained about the ambrosia and nectar thing that mortals couldn't use because it was lethal to them. That just sealed the deal. I really was a demi-god and so was Percy. You know, I really thought that Percy would turn out as a shop assisstant and not as some powerful demi-god. Well, to me he wasn't all that powerful but you know what I mean.

I tried putting some weight on my leg and it felt much better so Malcolm offered to give me a tour. I was still limping around but it didn't seem to bother anyone and Malcolm said that it was really common in Camp Half-Blood to be injured so I just accepted that. He showed me everywhere that Percy had been and a few other places that Chiron hadn't been able to show him just yet. I found out that the Hephastus kids preferred to spend all of their time in the forges making armour and weapons for themselves. The mess hall didn't have a roof and when I asked about what they did when it rained Malcolm just gave me an odd look. I dropped the subject.

We then went to the cabin area and I got to see Cabin 7# for myself. It looked way better than any of the other cabins and had this huge blue shield surrounding it. That was why nobody could get inside or near it. It made the Ares cabin look like a hovel and they weren't shy about giving the cabin a sneer every time they walked past it. I figured that Athena must have a personal vendetta against Ares because putting a cabin like that beside one like his was clearly sending a message that they did not get along well. Maybe he had done something and Athena had taken a personal offence. I wasn't sure.

After Malcolm had explained a bit more about the cabin that his mother had built we went to visit his own cabin. The first Athena cabin. I didn't see what all the fuss was about because the inside was like a dream come true for any braniac but Malcolm stayed firm in his reasoning. It was favoritism. Although, if what people thought about the gods was true then I assumed that they would be used to favoritism by now. None of the other people in the Athena cabin seemed to be open about their feelings on the cabin. Malcolm said that nobody in the cabin, not even he himself, could _hate_ the owner of the cabin. They mourned for that person once every year on the anniversary of their disappearance and another one was coming up soon.

I liked the Athena kids right away. Most of them had blonde hair and grey eyes like mine except my eyes were stormy and more intense. They thought I might be their half sister for some reason but then Malcolm said that I was Percy's twin sister and I got some really suspicious looks. I overheard some whispers about rivalry with Poseidon and got confused but Malcolm just showed me around and told me to ignore them. So I did. The Athena kids seemed really interested in me because according to them people had known that Percy existed but not that I existed. I found that a little insulting but they assured me that they were just curious.

When Percy came into the area where the cabins where with Luke a few hours later I was sat on the steps of the Athena cabin with Malcolm and two others reading books that were written in Ancient Greek and debating about different things. I never brought up Cabin 7# because of how sad they all looked when they would catch a glimpse of it out of the corner of their eye. I saw Luke whisper something into Percy's ear and Percy got this understanding look on his face. That meant that either he accepted my new friends which was unlikely or he knew why I was hanging around with these kids which was the most likely.

"Is your brother like you?" One of the Athena kids asked.

I shook my head. "Nope."

"Not even a little bit?"

"Well, we both have short tempers and the same parents. But other than that we're not that much alike."

"Isn't that a little bit uncommon with twins?"

"With identical twins it is but with un identical twins it happens sometimes."

"Well it's dinner time at seven thirty and that's in a few minutes. Do you have to go and look after your brother until then?"

"For the safety of everyone in the Hermes cabin I probably should." I said and stood up. "Bye."

"Bye Annabeth."

I walked over to Percy who was on his way inside the Hermes cabin. He waited for me to catch up since I was still limping and was going to be for the next couple of days.

"How'd it go?" He asked.

"Surprisingly good," I said. "The Athena kids are nice."

"Really? Malcolm doesn't seem to like me that much."

"That's probably because you're such an insensitive person, Percy. You speak without thinking."

"Don't you? No, wait, I forgot that it's _impossible_ for you to stop thinking."

I smacked him on the back of the head. "Shut up, Percy."

"Let's just go inside."

We walked inside the Hermes cabin and over to a small spot on the floor that was vacant. It looked as though me and Percy could just about squeeze into it if we were lying down and sleeping there. I realized shortly afterwards that this was where we were supposed to be sleeping until we were claimed by our godly parent, our father, and I was suddenly glad that my injuries meant I had to stay in the infirmary. Apparently head injuries like the one I had just above my left eyebrow were taken very seriously at Camp Half-Blood and they wanted to make sure there was no permanent damage done.

Percy set the Minotaur horn down on the floor and we both sat down together. I got a good look at the Hermes cabin. It was filled with demi-gods who were horsing around. I remembered what Malcolm had said about the Capture the flag games. The two sides where usually led by the Ares and Athena cabins but this time they were on the same side. Apparently the last time there was a Capture the flag game it had been taken by an Apollo camper and now they were running one team. The Hermes cabin and the Aphrodite cabin were on their team this time with all the other cabins on the other team.

"How has your day been?" I asked.

"Confusing," Percy admitted. "And depressing. Yours?"

"You mean aside from the fact that I only woke up because five kids were trying to beat me up when I was defenceless?" I said. "It was depressing too. I just can't believe that mom is gone."

Percy sighed. "What do we do now, Annabeth? We've got nothing. Only each other left. How are we supposed to go on?"

"I don't know," I replied. "But I do know one thing. We're going to get through this, Percy. It's going to be fine once things sort themselves out. Mom got us a place to stay before that thing took her away from us. We shouldn't let things get us down when she would have wanted us to be happy. Maybe we'll just wait until we're claimed and then things will get better."

"I sure hope so," Percy said.

"Hey," Luke interrupted our conversation and came to sit down beside us. "What'ya talking about dwellers?"

"What we're going to do now our mothers gone," Percy replied.

Luke inclined his head in an understanding manner. "I know what you mean. Lots of kids here have nothing left and don't know what they're supposed to do for a long while. I'm sure you two will figure it out eventually."

"What about our father? Will he help us?"

I noticed how tight Luke's face got. "The gods are strange things Percy. They only care about what makes them more powerful and safer. Demi-gods are just an add-on they don't need."

"But the gods must care about their children."

"No. They care about power and making themselves look good. That's all."

"If that's true then why was Cabin 7# built?" I asked. "The story behind that _proves_ that the gods must care. Athena at least."

"She probably just wanted to make the others look bad."

"Or you probably just want to come up with reasons to justify your argument that have no literal meaning or evidence behind them," I retorted.

"Okay Annabeth lets just remember that _I'm_ your brother here. Not Luke." Percy reminded me but I just rolled my eyes. So what if Luke wasn't my brother?

A conch shell horn blew in the distance. I could tell that it was a conch shell horn because I'd heard Mr. Brunner, or Chiron, use one when he was outside demonstrating to some fifth graders. Luke shouted to the other campers in the cabin and we all filed out into the commons area where we lined up. Me and Percy where at the very back as we'd arrived at camp two days ago and Percy had to go in front of me because I'd arrived a few seconds after he did which was not my fault at all. I got stuck in this _thing_ and then there was a bright golden light and I hadn't told anyone about it yet. Percy only knew that I'd came in after he did.

I was really miffed by that but managed to calm down after giving Percy a good punch in the back. He turned around and punched me right back in the arm. I returned the favour and things were about to get ugly when the Hermes cabin started to move out and we had to start walking. We were both grumbling under out breaths.

"I'll get you later."

"Bring it on."

We walked in a line all the way to the mess hall. The other cabins were either in front of us or coming along beside us. I noticed that the Hermes cabin was the last one to go inside for some reason and figured that it was because there were so many of us and not enough space for us all to go in at once. Me and Percy stayed close together even though we kept whispering threats to one another of pain and punches. There were thirteen tables in the mess hall for all of the cabins and I couldn't help but look at the one for Cabin 7#. It didn't have a scratch on it which made me frown because if the Ares campers were as bad as Malcolm had said they were then the table should be a pile of wood.

Table eleven was so overcrowded that me and Percy had to rush to get any seat at all. We just managed it and some poor kid ended up sitting with half his body on the floor and the rest of him on the seat. It looked really uncomfortable. Table five was the Ares kids and they were belching and laughing like slobs behind us. I really didn't like it. There was lots of noise until Chiron pounded his hoof against the marble floor and straight away everybody went silent. He raised his glass in the air.

"To the gods!" He shouted.

Everyone else raised their glasses as well. "To the gods!" They shouted.

There were things that had followed us into the pavilion that started to come forwards. Wood nymphs they were called. They had food too. We had also been followed in by naiads and satyrs who were now sitting at many different tables. Grover was sitting with Dionysus at table twelve and the Apollo kids were sat at table... seven. I frowned. That was odd. I noticed that the table for Cabin 7# didn't actually have a number on it and just the words _Athena 2 _in shiny bronze letters at one end. Maybe it was because the number thirteen was considered unlucky in some cultures and the Ancient Greeks thought it unlucky too.

Me and Percy looked at our cups with frowns on our faces. Some of the other kids had actually had a sip or two from their own and that was really confusing.

"Speak to it," Luke said from beside Percy. "Tell it what drink you want. Non-alcoholic beverage of course."

Percy spoke to his cup and it became his favourite fizzy drink that mom, by some cooking miracle, had managed to turn blue. I looked down at my own cup not knowing what to say when it filled up with a blue drink too. I frowned and Percy leaned over me to see it. He was also frowning.

"Either I've gone death or your cup just filled itself up automatically," He commented.

"What?" Luke asked, leaning over to get a good look. "Wow, that shouldn't have happened. Nothing short of the gods can tamper with these things."

"Maybe Annabeth just thought about it and that's what made it work?"

"It's possible although you'd have to be a really strong demi-god for that to happen."

"Great," Percy grumbled. "I'm doomed."

I snickered at him and he glared back at me in response.

Chiron, who was standing to one side now because there was no more room for him in the main area with all the nymphs moving around, whispered something to Diodonyus. He nodded and stood up. Everyone fell silent.

"Just to let you know, there are two new campers here today." He announced. "Peter and Annie Johnson."

Chiron whispered something else.

"What? Oh..." Dionysus cleared his throat. "I mean, Percy Jackson and Annabeth Jackson... wait, there are two of them?" He then asked Chiron who nodded. "Well then, I guess we're all surprised."

I had no idea what he meant until I remembered what I got told in the Athena cabin. People knew about certain demi-gods and they had been watching Percy for a long while. Then they guessed that Chiron and Grover must have seen me and realized that we were twins and that they had just missed it because of the powerful aura coming off of us both. I still didn't understand that at this point. Most of the campers, the ones who had no idea that I even _existed_ started looking towards our table to try and find me. But with twenty kids all sat in one place it was pretty hard for any of them to see me at all. I was really grateful for that.

The wood nymphs served food after that and I stopped Percy before he could eat anything when I noticed the other campers getting out of their seats and moving to the large fire pit in the middle of the room. Luke told us both to follow him and we did. There were kids throwing the best things on their plates into the fire but I didn't see what for. Then they would sniff sometimes and walk away. I couldn't smell a thing. Not even the smell of something burning. That just made me even more confused. Percy decided to ask Luke in the most 'subtle' way possible what they were doing.

"Offerings to the gods," Luke explained. "They enjoy the smell."

"The smell?" I asked.

"Yeah, helps them out with stuff. I'm not sure what but it's still something we have to do."

I didn't ask any more questions. When me and Percy got up to the fire we exchanged a look of awkwardness. You see, we had no idea who to make this offering to so I just used the sign language we made up to go with Plan B. Make a request in your head that the offering goes to the person it's supposed to. We did that and Percy got the look on his face like he did at Montauk which must have meant he could smell it. I didn't smell anything for a moment but then I did. It was just like my moms smell but different. More comforting and soft. But that wasn't possible. My mom was the best person in the world and I would find her again.

We went to sit back down and then started to eat. As we ate we started to talk and laugh just like the other kids were doing. There was just one difference with us though. We wouldn't talk to any other camper at all. They'd try to start a conversation and we'd close it in record time. Well, I say _we_ but I really mean _me_. Percy didn't know how to end the conversations because of how clueless he is so I had to help him out a lot of the time. I went to take a sip of my drink to find out what it was but stopped dead in my tracks. Not because I knew better than to drink from something when I didn't know what was inside but because of something else.

There was an owl in my drink. Not literally _in_ it but on the surface of the blue liquid. It was made of golden lines and looked very familiar but I just couldn't place it. A moment later, the 2D outline of the owl disappeared and I was left blinking stupidly at my cup. Percy snapped me out of my daze with a grumble about my personal hygiene. I lost my temper. We got into a loud argument about who was worse than who and everybody looked at us because of it. The Ares kids looked confused at first but then got these ugly grins on their faces and started watching us like we were part of an entertainment show on TV.

Chiron was about to step in but Dionysus stopped him. He looked like he was anticipating something and had a look that almost mirrored those of the Ares campers. You can pretty much guess that things weren't pretty after that. Percy threw the first punch but I caught it and slugged him in the gut hard enough for everyone to hear it. Then we got into a wrestling match where I totally owned my brother. He got himself humiliated at first but then he hit one of the Ares campers who went to fight him and then got decked. We both smirked at him, then at each other and hi-fived right there. Chiron stepped in when Dionysus saw that the entertainment was over and took us both outside much to the outrage of the now unentertained Ares kids.

"Percy, Annabeth," He said sternly with his arms crossed. "That kind of behaviour is unacceptable. Fighting may be allowed in certain places but the mess hall where the gods can see it is not one of them. How do you explain your actions?"

Percy looked at me.

"The primal instincts of siblings is to fight and that was a demonstration of it. Sibling rivalry is, at times, unavoidable and completely out of our control." I explained. "We had no control over our actions in there."

"None?" He asked with disbelief.

"None." I lied. "Percy wouldn't have been able to deck that Ares kid if we had been in control of our actions. It was because the adrenaline was pumping."

Chrion obviously did not believe me but my argument was air tight. Either he said that there was no such thing as sibling rivalry or that we weren't related, which was impossible because we were twins and every god is related to one another. He gave Percy a stern look and sent him back to the Hermes cabin. I actually got _escorted_ back to the infirmary because Chiron said that I had proved to be the most troublesome out of the two of us and that I had more fighting skill than Percy. He also banned me from fighting with Percy until he had learned a thing or two at camp but I knew that wasn't going to happen. I decided to humor him for a while though.


	8. I Get A Trident, She Gets An Owl

**Hidden Away**

**Disclaimer: I own nothing, all credit goes to the owner/creator of Percy Jackson. **

**Summary: Cursed so that Athena can never sense her, Annabeth is constantly attacked by monsters. At age three she was found in an alleyway by Sally Jackson and grew up as Percy's 'twin' sister. When the lighting bolt is stolen Athena slowly begins to ****realize**** that the demi-god helping Jackson is actually her own daughter. **

_**I Get A Trident She Gets An Owl, Percy Jackson**_

The days after that fight in the mess hall were absolute _torture_ for me and smooth sailings for Annabeth. When I was woken up by the rest of the Hermes cabin coming in for sleep they laughed at me about the fight between me and my sister. They congratulated me for decking that Ares kid but that had been a complete accident so they just went back to laughing at me. I was fairly certain that my first impression upon the campers had been of a weak boy who got beaten up on a daily basis by his twin sister who was far better at fighting than he was. Actually, all of that was true apart from the weak part.

I was given chores to do just like everyone else but Annabeth didn't have to do them because of her injured leg and head injury. That meant she was spending all of the time I was gone with the Athena kids and something about them just didn't sit right with me. Whenever I wasn't doing my chores I was doing the many activities around camp and, because she was my twin, Annabeth had to come with me. We had both been given the same times for everything we did. I got myself humiliated in just about every activity we tried and Annabeth ended up falling over from laughter so we both lost.

The counselors were watching us a lot of the time and I doubt I would have noticed it if Annabeth hadn't. She spotted them following us when we were on our way to the first of our many activities in Camp Half-Blood. We didn't say anything to them just in case they weren't for us but they really were focusing on just us. Our first activity was with Chiron and he wanted us both to try archery before the Apollo campers arrived and started practicing. Me and Annabeth were stumped. He just told us to try things out with a bow and we were left fumbling around for a good seven minutes before Annabeth finally figured it out. Even she had never bothered to learn a thing about archery.

When we both got ready Chiron told us to fire at the targets. The counselors were watching and I knew this was going to be really humiliating for both of us. You know what? I was wrong... _again_. Turns out being intelligent does pay off in archery because Annabeth had figured out exactly where to aim for you to get close to the bulls eye. I started up an argument right afterwards saying how it wasn't fair and she shoved me just as I fired. My arrow ended up bouncing all over the place and we both had to hit the deck to avoid getting skewered by it. We were very surprised when Chiron didn't complain. Not even as he plucked the stray arrow out of his tail. We decided it was best to move on to the next activity.

Grover met up with us at the rock wall and asked if he could join us for the rest of the day. He started explaining things about his searchers license and all of that but I didn't understand more than a few words of it. Annabeth filled me in a minute after Grover had finished speaking. The rock wall wasn't exactly how you'd picture one. It had two walls that smashed together if you didn't get to the top quick enough and lava that poured out of it and burned you to death if you got stuck. I really did not want to get stuck and Annabeth shared my thinking. We tried to send Grover up first but he said that as many as three at a time could go and that Annabeth was allowed to go too even if she was injured.

I did not think this was very fair on her but Grover was so insistent that neither of us had any more time to protest and he shoved us towards the rock wall. Once again, the counselors were watching us and I just knew that they were going to think poorly of Annabeth after this one. Grover scurried up the rock wall at top speed which left me and Annabeth at the bottom. We tried to get up as fast as we could but every once in a while Annabeth would catch her leg on a sharp rock and freeze up. She never winced or anything but she would just freeze up and get this expressionless look on her face so that no-one could know what she was feeling.

Whenever this happened I would have to grab her arm and haul her up a few feet before she unfroze and could do it herself again. The walls started to get closer together and I was pretty sure we were going to get squashed at the rate we were going when Annabeth stopped freezing up as the adrenaline kicked in and we just barely managed to get to the top. The lava singed our hair and I had holes in my clothes. Annabeth had somehow escaped that but she did have smoke coming off of her that didn't seem normal. We had to go to the infirmary after that because it turned out Annabeth's adrenaline rush had come from her leg fracturing so she had to get a cast for it.

Annabeth wasn't able to do any other activities after that and Chiron said that she would have to take it easy if she wanted to participate in Capture the flag on Friday. Of course, Annabeth didn't like that at all but she did take it easy. Or at least as easy as she could take it when she was who she was. Annabeth Jackson. Every time I did an activity she'd be sat on the sidelines reading from a massive book and twitching because of her ADHD and how she couldn't sit still because of it. The counselors were still watching us and trying to figure out who our godly parent was. They would toss around some names but every time they looked for one of those qualities I'd mess something up and Annabeth would be stuck reading her book again.

Every time she tried to do something Grover would stop her or I would have to help if the ADHD got a little out of hand.

That was how I got a large bruise on my forehead.

For three days me, Annabeth and Grover had fun at Camp Half-Blood and forgot all about our worries. I just wish I'd been able to spend more time like that with my best friend and my sister. I had no idea that after Friday I would never be able to talk about Annabeth in the same way again.

We had all braved the rock wall again since Annabeth had got the cast removed from her leg an hour prior. Our clothing was singed but this time mine had no holes in it as there was no more freezing up on Annabeth's part and we had scrambled to the top a few minutes after Grover did. Then we'd gone to the pier to sit and relax. I was watching the water nymphs who were sitting at the bottom of the sea and Annabeth was keeping one eye on me at all times to make sure nothing 'lovey dovey' happened between us. As if a kid like me would ever manage to get kissed by a water nymph.

Grover had started up a conversation about the life of a satyr after Annabeth had let her curiosity get the better of her. Now we had to keep smiles on our faces so as not to hurt Grover's feelings when he told us of how a little satyr would run in the meadows and play with nature. Me and Annabeth had shared many looks in those few moments and none of them conveyed a message about how happy we were to be involved in such a conversation. We would always talk about either mom, which was a very bad topic right then, or whatever had happened in the day. More often than not we would end up fighting one another just because there was nothing else to do.

That was when Luke showed up and told us that we had a sword-fighting lesson so that we would be prepared for Capture the flag later on. Grover was faster than me at speaking so that he could tell us more about the little satyrs but Annabeth had years of answering questions in class to her name so she spoke first. I was really happy that I had her for a sister since she had gotten me out of more tough spots than I could count even though half of them were ones she herself had put me in. The whole of cabin eleven was there. We were stood in a large, circular arena where Luke was our instructor since he had been at camp for a long time and was our cabin counselor.

We started off with the basics. You know, the slashing and stabbing and stuff like that. The other campers all did great and I thought that me and Annabeth were doing okay too. Especially since every once in a while we'd argue and end up trying to chop each other's heads off. Luke had to come over and make sure that we stayed on opposite sides of the arena just in case one of us actually _did_ chop the other's head off. That didn't stop us from glaring at one another and using rude gestures every few minutes. The Hermes kids thought it was great and Luke didn't notice it when we were careful enough. After all, they were the kids of the god of thieves.

There was a slight problem for the two of us though. I couldn't find a sword that felt right in my hands and whenever Annabeth looked at a sword that was offered to her she'd look disgusted despite her best efforts to hide it. She wouldn't admit it to anyone other than me but she felt that a sword just wasn't the right weapon for her to use. But you had to admit that even though she herself didn't feel like she should use one Annabeth was absolutely deadly with a sword. The stuffed Greek dummy she had been practicing on was in tatters and she'd only slashed it a few times. I was amazed.

Luke agreed that none of the swords fitted me but was just confused about Annabeth. We both tried to convince her that she was good with a sword but when she gave me the 'drop it or I'll kill you' glare I decided to let Luke try this one. He didn't have much success so we kept looking. In the end we just decided to pick the swords that fitted us both best and leave it at that. Annabeth still didn't look like she liked having a sword in her hand at all but she managed to completely destroy what was left of the dummie. I on the other hand wasn't able to do more than cut up some of the straw. Annabeth had actually managed to leave a bunch of dents in the armour on her first practice.

Then Luke said to pair up but when it came to me and Annabeth he said there was one catch. He had to make sure we didn't do something stupid and kill each other. I had no problems with that since seeing my sister with a sword was kind of scary. The fact that she was going to use it on me once she got the chance was even more scary. Now, I know what you're thinking. A brother against his sister was obviously going to win. You know what? You were _wrong_. I got my butt kicked to the moon and back several times each of which were more humiliating than before. One time her blade caught my hair and I got that much needed hair cut on a few strands of my black hair. After that Luke called a break for everyone to regain their energy. The wink he gave me said that it was to stop me from being humiliated even more.

The other campers in cabin eleven started talking to one another and having drinks of water and such. One camper poured it over his head and I decided to do the same. I know it sounds crazy but the second the water touched my face I felt miles better. In fact, I looked like Annabeth did after the first part of our sword-training and she didn't looked the least bit tired. We had another four minutes of our break left and we stayed standing whilst everyone else sat down. I had been lectured on sitting down in recess by Annabeth before because it 'lowers your heart rate and makes it harder to get back up and continue your lesson'.

"You look tons better, Percy." Annabeth commented.

"Really?" I asked stupidly.

"Yeah," She had a mischievous glint in her eye. "Now you're worthy of your title of Lord of the Bathroom."

She started laughing when I hit her in the arm and I kept hitting her playfully to try and get her to stop. "Shut up, Annabeth." I said. "Just because you've never been in one."

"Oh, believe me Percy, there is _no_ person on this planet who would survive a trip in the bathroom that _you_ use." Annabeth retorted and managed to continue laughing.

I punched her shoulder harder this time and her laughter died down to chuckles. I knew that I had walked right into that one and was probably bright red at that moment. Annabeth always managed to embarrass me no matter where we were and sword-fighting was no different. She had to have a thousand ideas in her head by now about how to get around my sword and chop my head off that were only for use in emergencies. I wasn't too keen about sparking that emergency reaction so I made sure that if I ever did get the better of her, which was extremely unlikely, I wouldn't wound her in any way. After all, she'd never wounded anything on me today aside from my pride.

Four minutes later, and after me and Annabeth had gotten into a mini-water fight which made me feel loads better, Luke called us all back in and made me join him for a demonstration. I went pale right away when he announced that and Annabeth clapped me on the shoulder reassuringly.

"You'll be fine," She'd said. "Just make sure not to land on your head or butt. Those are the most embarrassing."

"Thanks," I'd muttered back. "You won't let him kill me will you?"

"Are you insane? If anyone's going to get rid of you it's going to be _me_." Annabeth had a smirk on her face that let me know just how serious she was about that even if it sounded like a joke.

I walked into the center of the wide circle of people who were standing around Luke and waited to be knocked off my feet again. I felt kind of strange right then and was certain that it was just my body preparing to be thrown against something solid. Luke demonstrated a complicated move that the other campers frowned at. They were confused about how to perform it themselves whilst Annabeth didn't look any different. I swear, nothing gets past that sister of mine. Then I picked up my sword again, the one he had just knocked from my hands, and he said that we were going to spar until one knocked the others sword from their hand. So, we fought and might I just say that we fought pretty well.

Even Annabeth seemed impressed. Although, she's amazed that I can walk around so I guess that one doesn't really count. I wasn't sure how it happened but I felt full of energy and like I had years of fighting experience with someone other than my twin sister. When Luke tried to disarm me I blocked him and fought back. His eyes widened momentarily in surprise before they became narrowed with determination and our fight became faster and more skilled than before. After a while I started to get tired. My energy started to leave me and I made a lot of sloppy moves that would have gotten me killed had Annabeth not thrown something at my sword so that it moved to block it. _That_ was a skill I could use.

Then I had an idea. I moved my sword and Luke's so that I had a clear shot at the hilt of Luke's sword and used the maneuver that he had used. There was a _clang_ and a _clatter_ as Luke's sword fell out of his hand and landed on the floor. The other Hermes kids were amazed and so were all of the undetermined ones. I wished I had a camera because for the first time in my life I saw Annabeth look at me with an impressed look. I'd never felt so proud of myself. Mainly because Annabeth was the one person who never looked impressed by a thing I did and that really brought me down. But I guess things do change with time.

"Wow, Percy, that was amazing!" Luke said as he picked up his sword. "Show us that again."

However, I couldn't repeat what I'd done. I tried harder than I'd ever tried before but I just couldn't do it. I didn't understand it and neither did anyone else... well, Annabeth had the 'face' again. The 'face' was the term I used to describe her thinking face and it was a face that she used a _lot_. One of the campers suggested that it was beginners luck and Luke suggested that I should use a balanced sword. The training session ended pretty soon after that and as we were walking out Annabeth put her arm around my shoulders and steered me in the direction of Grover and the strawberry fields.

"You know Percy, I may not say it all that often - and believe me when I say I'm not going to repeat this - but you are pretty good at making people's mouths drop open." She commented with a smirk.

I smirked back. "Thanks Annabeth," I said. "Now what's your reason behind saying that?"

"Can't a sister say something like that to her brother?"

I could have sworn I heard a woman's voice shout on the winds _'No!' _but I shrugged it off. The wind couldn't speak as far as I knew.

"Not when you're the sister and I'm the brother."

Annabeth sighed. "Well then wonder-twin, if you think you know me so well then get us out of _this_ and I'll buy you a blue milkshake."

Grover was waiting for us by the strawberry fields and you could just tell by the way there were three baskets at his hooves what he wanted us to do. When you lived with a sister like Annabeth life was never boring like that. We always did the funnest things around. So I sucked it up and decided that when there was a blue milkshake at stake I just couldn't let this thing pass.

Unfortunately I never did get us out of that horribly embarrassing strawberry picking situation.

That night after dinner, which me and Annabeth had to eat at table twelve where Chiron and Mr. D could see us and make sure we didn't fight anymore. I could have sworn that Mr. D was trying to encourage a fight between us instead of trying to stop one but the furthest we got was a heated argument about who had the worst looking hair and he didn't seem to enjoy the fact that there was no violence involved. I even saw him cross his fingers under the table and pray to himself that a fight would happen just so he could taunt the loser about it later on in the day. Annabeth gave me a look that said she'd seen it too and just to annoy him we stopped arguing for the whole of dinner after that.

Everyone was abuzz with excitement throughout the whole of dinner because today was Capture the flag. I had no idea why every camper was so excited about the game. It was pretty obvious who was going to win and it certainly wasn't going to be our team. Annabeth had filled me in on the details and we both knew that the Ares and Athena kids were the best fighters in the whole of Camp Half-Blood which meant that even if we had a fighter like Luke on our team we were doomed. I didn't understand how everyone could have their spirits so high and Annabeth said that _I_ was the one who was doomed. She said that if I didn't learn to be optimistic I was going to be slaughtered and I knew that she was right. That didn't mean I had to tell her though.

The conch horn was blown once the plates had all been cleared away and a massive roar of cheers erupted all around the room from every table except the one we were at. Table twelve. I got the feeling that it was because Mr. D didn't approve of loud noises and his children had those genes inside of them. I almost felt sorry for the kids. Malcolm ran into the pavilion with two of his campers and a flag whilst an Apollo camper and two of his siblings came in from another area with their own flag. I glanced over at table eleven and found them all shouting and cheering as loud as they possibly could for the Apollo kids.

"Those are the flags," Annabeth said to me over the noise in the mess hall. "You have to get one for you to lead a team."

"I'm guessing Malcolm told you this?" I asked.

"No. The Stoll brothers did after I decked them for trying to pickpocket me with nothing in my pocket," She said.

"So, what, they just repaint the flags each time someone gets one?"

Annabeth shrugged her shoulders. "No idea. They just said 'you'll see' and that was it." She replied. "I'm not really very keen to find out what they mean considering who they are."

"You got that right."

Alliances were announced and me and Annabeth looked at our competition. It wasn't pretty. And that was saying something considering the fact that the Aphrodite kids were in the way of our view. The Ares kids were the meanest, ugliest and most disgusting kids I'd ever seen and Annabeth made a gagging noise for emphasis which made me snicker. The Athena kids looked like the braniacs who were really good athletes and could run ten miles without breaking a sweat. They weren't muscular like the Ares kids but you could tell by looking at them that you shouldn't mess with them in any maths quizzes or races. You wouldn't want to fight them either.

Chiron made the announcements about the rules and how he was the referee and medic on the field. Then he spread his hands and bronze weapons appeared on the tables. There were swords, shields, armour, spears, bows and even a few hammers for the Hesphastus kids which made me gulp. We were in serious trouble if they got one of us on our own and started bashing our brains out with a hammer.

"Hey, kids," Me and Annabeth turned around to see Luke standing behind us. "Here, Chiron thought that you guys would be better suited with these." He handed me a shield the size of a blackboard you found in those classrooms and weighed four times as much. We both got helmets with blue plumes on top of them, body armour that was for 'our own protection' and a few hints on how to stay alive. I thought we stood a chance until Annabeth got given a _dagger_ and a sword that she gave a disgusted look at. I knew she hated swords and a dagger wasn't going to do much for her. She didn't have a shield either but I couldn't protest. Everyone was heading out and we were getting carried away with them.

The Apollo kid shouted, "Blue team, forward!" and our whole team followed him.

Luke caught up with us a moment later. "Hey, you guys are on border patrol. Just stand at the creek and made sure no reds get past you. The Apollo guys had great aim with their bows so you should be fine and out of the way."

"Should?" Annabeth asked. "You mean we're going to get our butts kicked if we go where the action is."

"Yep," Luke confirmed with a grin. "A little time on the sidelines never did anyone any harm."

"It does if the people on the sideline knock your block off," Annabeth grumbled as he walked ahead of us.

I turned to look at her. "What's your problem with him? Luke's a nice guy. He took us into his cabin without any complaints at all. I've never felt more at home in any of the places we've been sent to before."

"I have this feeling about him, Percy." Annabeth said. "It's like there's a voice in the back of my head telling me to stay away from him and every time I'm around him it takes control and I get all moody. It's probably just something that happens."

"Right," I said with sarcasm. "Everybody has voices in their heads that tell them what to do."

"Just because you're missing the voice of common sense," She retorted with a cocky smirk.

"And you're missing the voice of sanity."

I got whapped on the back of the head by the flat of her sword. I sent Annabeth a fierce glare as we continued to walk and I rubbed the now sore spot on the back of my head. Our team went south whilst the others went north. Things were probably going to get ugly when the two teams met in the middle and I had to admit that I was happy me and Annabeth were going to be out of the action this time around. We would end up being beaten to within an inch of our lives and then laughed at by the Ares kids. I figured that every trick in the book - which was rewritten by Annabeth - couldn't save us from the humiliation of what was about to come.

I really had to learn to stop being wrong all the time.

We had both been stationed by the creak and were watching the borders. It was really uncomfortable to be stood out in the open with a bunch of kids fighting in the woods, the sound of metal hitting metal around you and to know that if so much as one person from the enemy team saw you then you were toast. Annabeth tried to lift my spirits but nothing she told me would work. In the end she started an argument to get me warmed up since we always had a few shoves at the very least in our arguments. When we finished the argument, which Annabeth won since she'd started it, I felt much better and gave her a smile in thanks. Then we both heard the voice that made my skin crawl.

"Cream the punk!" Clarisse shouted as she and four other campers from her own cabin appeared and came racing towards us. The four other campers looked at me with a murderous glare but then they caught sight of Annabeth and skidded to a halt. Clarisse looked where they were looking and came to a halt aswell. She began sizing up Annabeth with that ugly face of hers. "Oh, it's _you_." She said with an emotionless tone.

I didn't know what was going on until I remembered that these were the campers who had tried to 'murder' Annabeth whilst she was sleeping and then she had surprised them all by knocking them on their butts. I'd knocked them all down with a jet of water so I didn't see what they were cautious of but then it hit me. Annabeth had been able to knock them all down without any preparation at all. In fact, she'd been asleep and injured in the infirmary when it had happened. That was enough to make anyone cautious of a girl like Annabeth so I was once again glad that I had her for a sister.

"You don't mind if we kill the punk, do you?" She asked with a sneer.

"Honestly? No," Annabeth answered and I blanched. "But when the killing thing is real then I'm going to have to say that I _do_ mind."

Clarisse took a step forward threateningly and Annabeth did too but with way more effect. She'd been practicing on me for years and even though I was certain Clarisse had practice too it was a little bit more frightening when thunder clapped in the distance as Annabeth did it. I readied myself for the fight that was sure to come. These campers were used to rushing into things which meant their cautiousness of Annabeth wouldn't stop them for long. It just meant that we had a little more time to prepare ourselves.

The offending campers surveyed Annabeth for a moment longer before they all looked at me in unison and hatred overpowered the caution. They charged at us and I felt like running. Annabeth just stood her ground and got her sword ready even though she didn't like using it and had to keep repositioning it in her hands to get the right feel for it. We were caught in the middle of a circle before long and Annabeth and me stood back to back like we had so many times before when bullies had tried to beat me up and she had come to my rescue. Even I could see that this was just another version of that.

Clarisse was standing in front of me whilst the others were more focused on Annabeth. They knew that she could take them all on easily even if Clarisse was helping them out so it was no surprise that they were more concerned about her than me. Clarisse stabbed forwards with her spear and I lifted my shield just in time to block it. I thought I'd gotten away injury free from that blow but all my hairs stood on end and I realized that it was electricity sparking through my system. That meant that Clarisse's spear was a magic item just like some of the Apollo campers had. You see, this was why it paid to have a sister like Annabeth. I had an edge over most of the newbies.

Another jab with the spear had me jumping back. I'm not sure how she knew it was going to happen but Annabeth jumped forwards at the same time I jumped backwards and disarmed the unprepared Ares camper with a perfect flourish that I'd never seen before. Luke hadn't used it in sword-fighting training so that just left me wondering how on earth Annabeth had managed it. The other Ares kids panicked, although they covered it up easily, and tried to take her on all at once. Clarisse took the hint from them and dished it all out on me which I knew she wouldn't have done and Annabeth not disarmed that camper.

Annabeth broke away from the back to back thing we had going on to take on the four Ares campers at once whilst I got beaten up by Clarisse. I was too amazed by how fast Annabeth was moving to focus properly and I landed on my butt in the water of the creak. Instantly I felt energy filling my body and I blocked Clarisse's next blow with my sword. I spun around, ducked under a stab, came back up and sliced through her spear as it came around again as if cutting through a twig. Bits of it splintered and cut into my arm which wasn't as painful as it should have been. She watched with wide eyes as one half of her spear fell into the water before they became filled with anger.

"You idiot!" She shouted at me. "Punk! Stupid -"

She was cut off as a sword slashed downwards a centimeter in front of her face. Annabeth had defeated the four other campers who now lay on the ground and were groaning in pain and was now standing protectively in front of me like she always would when I was being bullied violently by someone other than herself. We have this rule between the two of us. If it hurts inside and out and it doesn't come from your twin then he or she has to come to your rescue. I've never had to do it for Annabeth before but she's done it plenty of times for me. Like now, for instance, in the face of an angry Ares camper with a shattered spear.

"Back. Off." Annabeth said with deadly calmness and Clarisse actually staggered back a few steps with fear etched all over her face. Thunder had clapped again in the distance right after Annabeth had said that but I wasn't paying attention even though I wouldn't have been so confused if I had been.

Then, suddenly, there were yells and screams nearby and we all turned to see Luke racing towards the boundary line between our territory and the enemies with a red flag in one hand and a sword in the other. Annabeth's grip around her sword went tight enough to make her knuckles white which obviously meant the voice was goading her on and trying to get her to kill Luke. I knew she was strong enough to fight the urge but I was still concerned for my twin sister. There were two Hermes campers flanking Luke and protecting him from the enemy whilst some of the Apollo campers fought off the Hesphastus kids when they tried to get to him.

"It was a trick!" Clarisse roared in outrage and raced towards her teammates and Luke, leaving us in the water of the creak. "Get him!"

But it was too late. Luke leapt over the line and into friendly territory and the red flag shimmered to become a silver flag with a cadeous in the middle. The symbol for cabin eleven. So that was how other cabins got flags. The blue team roared in victory as the red team cursed and bellowed out in outrage that they had lost. Clarisse kept throwing about the words 'bloody Jackson's!' and I could barely contain the grin that threatened to creep onto my face. I had never heard anyone say something like that before. It was always Annabeth this and Annabeth that and never once was my name mentioned. Well, my name wasn't exactly mentioned but it was implied. That was the best I'd ever gotten.

The blue team were carrying Luke around on their shoulders and doing victory arm pumps in the air when there was a howl from behind us. Everybody turned in that direction and froze. Standing on the rocks by the forest was a hound that was as black as night and as big as those rhinos you found in the east. It had huge fangs that had to be razor sharp and could tear through anything easily. And it was looking right in our direction with the specific target of the two of us. Chiron shouted something in Ancient Greek which sounded like English to me but none of the campers moved. The hound charged at me and Annabeth and that's when we decided to move.

Actually it was Annabeth who made the decision and gave me a hard shove to pass on the message. She ducked out of the way of it's teeth and claws with more speed than the nymphs I'd raced on the tracks at camp but I wasn't so lucky and she didn't escape unscathed either. Just as it was ripping open my armour and moving in for the kill with it's fangs and I heard Annabeth's yelp of pain as she put a hand on her wounded arm arrows sprouted from the monsters neck and it fell dead at my feet. Chiron trotted over to us at the moment me and Annabeth regained our senses and rushed to make sure our counterparts were alright. Our counterparts were what mom used when she spoke to one of us about the other because we were twins.

"_Di immortales_," Malcolm said as he ran up beside Chiron. "That was a hellhound, but how... they're not supposed to -"

"Someone summoned it," Chiron interrupted. "Someone from inside the camp."

Luke came over with the banner in his hand and his face set in a grim expression. His moment of glory at having won the flag from the two best fighting cabins in camp was over and he looked just as shocked as everyone else as they came slightly closer but remained in exactly the same spot they had been in before. My chest felt wet and warm and Annabeth was staring at anywhere but it which let me know just how bad it was. I decided to follow her example and look at anywhere but my chest which was probably in tatters.

"It was them!" Clarisse shouted. "They summoned it! The Jackson twins!"

"Silence child," Chiron told her.

We all stared at the disintegrating body of the hellhound which lay in the space between me and Annabeth. As the last part blew away in the wind like a speck of dust Annabeth turned her attention to me.

"You're hurt."

"So are you."

Then the campers gathered around us and stared at my chest and Annabeth's arm. My chest was healing up somehow and I realized that I was still standing in the water with Annabeth. Her arm wasn't healing like mine was, though. It was glowing a bright golden colour and the campers around us gasped. Chiron backed away a step like he had just realized something that he did not want to know and everyone was staring at the top of my head. Annabeth was too busy looking with interest at her arm and my chest to bother since learning a new thing always took priority with her.

"Your father..." Chiron said with disbelief. I was about to ask what he meant but he beat me to it. "Poseidon. Storm-bringer, father of horses, earth-shaker. Hail, Perseus Jackson Son of the Sea god and -"

He stopped dead in his tracks and the campers all gasped again but this time it was much louder and from pure and utter shock. They were all staring with their mouths wide open at a spot above Annabeth's head. Chiron didn't move or speak. Nobody did a thing except for me and Annabeth who were looking around in bewilderment. Eventually we looked at the spots above each other's heads and our eyebrows disappeared into our hairlines.

"Trident." Annabeth said.

"Owl." I said.


	9. We Get Some Unpleasant News

**Hidden Away**

**Disclaimer: I own nothing, all credit goes to the owner/creator of Percy Jackson. **

**Summary: Cursed so that Athena can never sense her, Annabeth is constantly attacked by monsters. At age three she was found in an alleyway by Sally Jackson and grew up as Percy's 'twin' sister. When the lighting bolt is stolen Athena slowly begins to ****realize**** that the demi-god helping Jackson is actually her own daughter. **

_**We Get Some Unpleasant News, Annabeth Jackson (Chase)**_

Camp Half-Blood was in uproar. After the initial shock had worn off, which took a food ten minutes, people started shouting things about the gods conspiring and playing games that made everyone confused. Chiron took both me and Percy up to the Big House without a second thought and we had to jog to keep up with him because he was going faster than any normal horse would at walking pace. It was more of a trot if you know what I mean. People were staring at us as we went but none of them dared to follow. Chiron had this look on his face that clearly said he meant business and that anyone who tried to stop us was going to be in huge trouble.

Mr. D was up there sipping on a Diet Coke on a sofa when we came in and he didn't do much as blink an eye when he saw Percy's shredded armour and Chiron's concerned face. It was as if these things happened all the time to him and I knew that they probably did since this was Camp Half-Blood where half-bloods trained to survive in the real world and got injured on a daily basis. There were kids using swords, shields and spears with only armour to protect them and parts of their body exposed that could cause death if they were slashed enough and left to bleed. I wondered if there was anything safe about being a half-blood but instantly knew that there wasn't.

"Dionysus, we have a problem." Chiron said as the three of us walked into the room.

"Let me guess," Mr. D said as he took another sip of his Diet Coke. "These two were injured on the battlefield or did some illegal move that caused harm to another camper."

"No. A much, much bigger problem involving the gods themselves." That made Mr. D look up with what could have been interest but I knew better.

"Oh?" He asked. "How so?"

"Percy here was claimed by Poseidon himself after a hell-hound was summoned to camp and tried to kill them both," Chiron explained.

"So the slimy sea serpent has two -"

"And Annabeth was claimed by Athena herself." Chiron interrupted him and Mr. D suddenly looked like a bomb had gone off.

"Athena..." He repeated. "But she has claimed all of her children aside from the youngest who went..." His eyes widened. "No... it can't be."

Me and Percy shared a look of confusion. We had no idea what they were talking about but I managed to pick up enough to know that it was impossible. My mother was Sally Jackson and most definitely _not_ Athena. A person couldn't have two biological mothers and I knew who my mother was. There had to have been a mistake. Maybe the rivalry between Athena and Poseidon had caused her to claim me before Poseidon could because if Percy was the son of Poseidon then I had to be the daughter of Poseidon. Me and Percy were twins and it was obvious in many ways if you just looked close enough. The way we spoke. The way we acted. Our sibling rivalry.

"There is one way to check," Chiron said. "We have to take her to the cabin."

"And I assume I must come as well?" Mr. D asked.

"Unless you want to suffer another curse for a hundred years at the hands of Athena."

"Alright, alright," Mr. D stood up and I knew that he was trying to act like he didn't care when it was obvious that he did. "Let's just get this over with."

He was anxious. I could hear it in the tone of his voice. I could also hear it in Chiron's voice too. Percy was looking like he could ask a thousand questions in half a second but we were herded out of the Big House like cattle by Chiron and Mr. D in the next moment so he never got to ask anything that made sense. I had the sneaking suspicion that even if his questions did make sense they would be ignored because the camp activities director and director had these emotionless looks on their faces that were guards to hide something else. I couldn't put my finger on it but I knew that something was wrong. Something to do with Athena and Poseidon.

All the campers had come back from the space where Capture the flag ended and were in the cabin area. I couldn't spot one person who was asleep inside the cabins and since all of the doors were left open from the cabins that were actually occupied you could tell that it was true. You could see right inside every cabin and count the exact number of kids who occupied the cabins since they were all either stood or sat outside talking to one another with shock and surprise in their voices. When we arrived flanked by Chiron and Mr. D they all looked up and fell silent. Their gazes did not leave us as we were led straight towards the one cabin that stood out from the rest.

Cabin 7#.

No sounds were made. Not even the birds in the forest tweeted as we walked towards the blue force field that surrounded the cabin that no-one except for the missing child of Athena could pass through and those they wanted to join them. Me and Percy started to get really nervous. Even with all the tension, confusion and secrets we knew exactly what was going on here. Poseidon had claimed Percy which was no problem at all when you ignored the fact that he was an illegitimate child of one of the Big Three but I had been claimed by Athena. I was a child that nobody had known about and I had a mother already who was mortal and knew about demi-gods. I silently prayed that I was wrong about what I knew was coming.

We stopped a few inches in front of the force field and Chiron gave me a gentle push forwards from behind with one arm whilst he held Percy's shoulder with the other. It was a comforting gesture for just in case what they thought was possible turned out to be true. Mr. D was watching with his undivided attention focused upon me and the cabin itself. I took a tentative step forwards and hesitantly reached out with my hand. I hadn't been told what to do but somehow I knew. The tips of my fingers skimmed the edges of the force field and I felt a sudden warmth flow through me. It was like I had come home from a very long trip away.

Feeling more confident now, I continued to stretch out my arm. My fingers passed through it. Then my hand. Then the first part of my right arm. I started to walk forwards and there was this warm golden glow around my outline as I passed right through the force field, dropped my arm to my side and turned around to look at the space I had just passed through. I could hardly believe it. This couldn't possibly be true in any way and yet here I was on the other side of a force field that couldn't be passed through by anyone but the demi-god who went missing and couldn't be sensed by any of the gods. It was so unlikely it seemed impossible.

"Annabeth..." Percy said in disbelief. "You... you got through it..."

I swallowed and looked around me at the force field. It wasn't sparking or throwing me out. It wasn't making any strange noises that suggested I wasn't supposed to be standing where I was. If anything it seemed to be even stronger than before now that I had passed through it to the spot where no-one had set foot for at least twelve years. Every camper who was sat down stood up and everyone had their mouths hanging open. The Ares campers had walked out of their cabin space to get a good look at me to make sure that I was standing where I was and the Athena kids sprinted all the way across the commons area to see me.

"I don't believe it..." Malcolm's voice was barely above a whisper. "You're the missing child... and all this time... living with the son of Poseidon..."

"Zeus is going to have a field day with this one." Mr. D commented. "This is the most complicated thing to have happened in a millennium. Not even when the daughter of Zeus was discovered compares to this. The children of Athena and Poseidon living under the same roof. Growing up together as twins."

"It's a conspiracy..." Clarisse said from behind me on the far side of the force field. "It has to be... Athena and Poseidon _hate_ each other. It's all a ploy... the gods are playing us!"

"Be careful what you say child," Chiron warned. "The proof is right in front of you and it is about time too. The lost child of Athena has returned and even though it may have been in the most unlikely of circumstances we must accept that."

"But Annabeth's my sister," Percy protested. "We grew up together. I'm pretty sure I'd remember if she wasn't my sister and I know that she is."

"Percy," Chiron sighed. "This is a truly complicated thing. As Dionysus said, it is the most complicated problem in the past millennium. We need to figure things out instead of jumping to conclusions..."

"So Annabeth can come out now?" Percy asked. "She doesn't have to stay behind that force field anymore?"

"Athena was very clear about what would happen once the missing child arrived here, boy," Mr. D told me with narrowed eyes. "The child will stay in the safety of the force field for one night at the very least so that she can make sure that the child is safe and healthy. No excuses and no loopholes."

"But... can't we go in there with her?"

"What part of 'only the missing child of Athena can enter' did you not understand?" Mr. D asked with a roll of his eyes like it was the most obvious thing in the world.

There was a zapping sound behind me and I turned around to see an Ares camper flying away from the force field after trying to get through it. Clarisse side-stepped the boy as he flew towards her and kept looking at the force field and me. She had something in those ugly eyes that was like realization but mixed with something else. I was amazed to see that it was not anger or hate. It was something that I couldn't quite make out but it was definitely not a negative thing. I frowned but didn't say anything. What could I say when I was on the other side of a force field and the topic of every bodies conversation?

"I'd advise that nobody else tries as this child has done and attempts to pass through the force field," Mr. D said lazily as he swirled his Diet Coke around in it's can. "There is nothing wrong with it and unless you want to be eaten by the harpies I'd start thinking about getting to bed."

Many campers started to back away to their own cabins with uncertain expressions on their faces and the Athena kids looked outraged. I wasn't about to accept that any one of them was my half brother or half sister so I didn't expect them to have outbursts that were quite so loud.

"What?" Malcolm exclaimed. "We've waited twelve years! Watching that cabin and waiting for someone to appear! Waiting for an explanation! How can you -?"

"You can wait a night longer," Chiron interrupted him. "And I seriously doubt that Annabeth has an explanation for this. She and Percy act more like twins than some of those here at camp and that type of relationship does not come from acting. Everyone to your cabins and I will be coming around personally to make sure that you are all in your beds tonight! Doors will be locked and harpies will be patrolling the commons area all night. Now, go!"

I'd never heard such a commanding voice before and apparently none of the other campers had either because they looked momentarily shocked at Chiron's actions instead of mine before they all turned and went back to their cabins. Nothing happened until they were all inside and had locked their doors behind them. Two Hermes kids tried to stay behind and watch but Chiron found them out really quickly and sent them back to their cabin with the promise of kitchen duty in the morning. I felt that it was rather harsh because they were only curious but I had to admit that I didn't like everyone staring at me and whispering to one another.

Once they were all gone, Chiron started to steer Percy away from me and towards cabin eleven.

"Hey! What are you -?"

"Percy, you need to go back to the Hermes cabin and rest. Tomorrow morning I will move you to cabin three but right now you must go and sleep. I will explain things as best I can. Go. Now."

Percy looked ready to protest but I met his gaze and shook my head at him to say 'do what he says, we'll talk more in the morning'. He didn't look happy about it but he just sighed and walked towards the Hermes cabin. Once he had knocked loud enough on the door and been allowed in by Luke, who then closed and locked the door behind him, Chiron and Mr. D turned to me. They weren't crossing through the force field which I found rather odd since I'd been told that the gods could pass through this thing too. I was debating whether or not to ask about it when Chiron spoke to me.

"Annabeth, you must go inside your cabin and get some sleep just like everybody else." He said. "When you wake you will stay inside and wait until everyone has gone to do their activities for the day. There will be certain periods of time when no camper will be around here and that is when you must come out and I will take you to the Big House."

"But... why?" I asked. "Why do all of these things need to happen? And why do people seem to think that I'm the daughter of Athena? I'm not. Percy is my brother and my twin. Our mother is Sally Jackson and that's the way it's always going to be."

"So ignorant..." Mr. D tutted. "I thought that these children were supposed to be intelligent."

"Please just do as I say, Annabeth." Chrion said and it was almost as if he was pleading with me. "Go inside your cabin. Have a look around if you wish and then go to sleep. It would be best for all of us if Athena can ensure that you are safe and healthy quickly so that the goddesses wrath is not brought down upon us."

I didn't understand. I didn't even try to understand at that point. Chiron and Mr. D wished me a good night and whilst Mr. D went back up to the Big House muttering things about curses and the gods Chiron went from cabin to cabin to check that everyone was in bed. I sucked in a deep breath and turned to look at the large cabin behind me. The area around it looked like it had been cared for by millions of satyrs. The grass was greener, there wasn't a single piece of litter or misplaced dirt, no stray stones or artifacts and nothing that could have made it seem like an untidy and unkept place. I found that strange since nobody had been able to get through the force field for twelve years aside from me.

Slowly, I made my way towards the cabin and walked up the two wooden steps to the decking. There was a set of two chairs and a table beside one of those swinging chairs to the left side whilst on the right there was a hammock next to a table that came up to it's height. It was for placing drinks and things that you didn't need to use at that moment when you were using the hammock. I looked down at the bronze doorknob that glistened in the moonlight and was having really bad thoughts about what might happen if I turned it. I'd lose the only family I'd ever known. My _real_ family. I could lose my brother who was all I had left and live a life of despair.

Somewhere in the middle of my thoughts I reached out and opened the door. It swung open silently and I hesitantly walked inside. There wasn't much light inside except for the moonlight that managed to light up the windowsills but was blocked from doing anything else by the white curtains with blue owls on them. I squinted my eyes to try and figure out where everything was but I just couldn't see in the dark. There was a switch on the wall right next to the front door and I pressed it after a moment of thought to see what it did. The lights in the room instantly turned on and let me look around.

There was a lightbulb in the Hermes cabin too but there was just one in there that covered the whole space and not much else to light up the area.

In this room which I decided was the front room there was a lot of things that definitely hadn't been in the Hermes cabin or the infirmary where I'd been spending the nights. Bookshelves covered the wall to the far left side that reached the ceiling and had enough books to make my eyes widen. There were books about everything I was interested in and it was like someone had just looked into my mind and picked out everything that I liked so they could put it in this cabin. A rug was in the center of the room and a blue sofa was positioned against the small space between the bookshelves and the next doorway, which didn't have a door in it, so you could read books there. I had a feeling I'd be sitting there a lot.

On the other side of the room was a desk and a chair that swung around and had comfortable padding on it. Basically, it was the typical desk chair you found in an office area. The carpet was a comfortable shade of red and I had to look twice to make sure it was there. A carpet. In the other cabins it was usually just a wooden floor with a few things here and there that the campers had left out. I was about to start walking across the room when I got an electric shock and jumped about ten feet in the air. I whirled around but there was nobody there. Just the door and a sign I hadn't seen before.

It read: _'Shoes off in Cabin 7#'_

I frowned but took off my shoes and left them on the mat in front of the door just in case some of the mud on my trainers got on the carpet and I was woken in the middle of the night by another electric shock. Once that was done I walked through the front room and into the next one. The red carpet stretched into here as well and made it seem more like a lounge you would find in a house than a cabin at a summer camp. I wasn't going to complain though. It was the perfect balance between a house and a cabin. The windows were wide and the walls were made of wood. The air from outside came in and made it smell like a forest and you could still see some of the wooden floor panels in some places.

In the lounge there was another blue sofa that was the exact same colour of my bed sheets back in the apartment that me and Percy had shared with our mom and two other arm chairs of the same colour on either side of it that faced inwards. They faced a fireplace that had two windows on the same wall to it's left and right. A staircase was in the corner that led upstairs but I couldn't get a clear view of what was up there. That was pretty much all there was in that room aside from the few short little bookcases that contained books, games and DVD's for use in a place that wasn't downstairs. I guessed that it had to be somewhere upstairs since there was no TV or gaming unit that I could see.

There were no other doors in the cabin apart from the front door so I could see into every room downstairs. I walked into a room that had smooth wooden planks and looked around. It was a kitchen. A small kitchen that was almost the exact same size of the one in our cabin at Montauk. There was a fridge tucked into the corner with some cabinets and counters along the sides. A microwave was on one of the counters but I didn't see how it could work since it wasn't plugged in. But by the way all of the lights were on and it looked as though it had just been bought I guessed that it had something to do with the guys who built the cabin.

I couldn't help myself. I was starving and out of energy from the Capture the flag game and I just had to check if there was any food about. Believe me when I say that there was. _Lots_ of food. The fridge was packed almost to the brim and everything was stacked where it was supposed to be. There were ready meals everywhere which was a huge relief for me since I can't cook to save my life. They were all my favourite meals too and the ones that my mom would cook back home. Lasagna was my most favourite food and it had a spot right in the middle of the fridge. I silently thanked whoever had put the food here because it was a life saver to me.

I had a look around because to me and Percy food was _everything_. True, Percy was staying in the Hermes cabin tonight but that didn't mean his impulse for food hadn't been passed onto me when we were younger. I left the kitchen five minutes later but I didn't eat anything or take anything with me. I just felt like sleeping right then and the bedroom was probably upstairs unless it was meant for me to sleep on the sofas. The day was starting to catch up with me and I stifled a yawn behind my closed fist before walking back into the lounge and climbing the wooden staircase. There wasn't any carpet on the stairs but they didn't have any splinters on them and looked smooth enough to slide down.

When I got upstairs I looked around and my eyebrows disappeared into my hairline for the second time that night. It looked like the hideout of a geeky teenager and I definitely fit that profile. There were fiction books on one very long bookshelf that stretched all the way across the room and mixed in with those were books about demi-gods such as Hercules and Heracles. There was a beanbag seat, which was also blue, in front of a TV that was on the wall. It was one of those flat screen TV's and had a black outline instead of the silver one that some people had on their old fashioned television sets. Just beneath that was one of those Sky boxes that recorded shows, a DVD player and a gaming unit with two controllers on top of it.

That was all that was in the main room and I walked into two other rooms that were upstairs. They were both directly across from the staircase and to the right of another room. One was a decently sized workshop that had three large desks up against the walls and equipment neatly stacked on them. I could tell that I was going to spend a lot of time in here since my dream was to become an architect and all I ever did in my free time was design new buildings. Several of which were torture chambers for Percy to stay in every time he made me mad. I had a good look around in that room.

The next room was just a bathroom that had all of the essentials, toiletries and even a shower. I just gaped at that. How could a cabin in a summer camp have electronics _and_ a shower? I came up with an explanation in my head about the powers of the gods and left the room. That's when I came to the only room in the cabin that had a door that wasn't the front door. It looked like it had been worked on for years and had detailed owls carved into the wood along with images of Greek warriors fighting against monsters. You'll never believe this but one of the images was a Minotaur and it looked newer than anything in the cabin. Like it had just been carved on a few days ago. Fighting the Minotaur were two kids. A boy holding a Minotaur horn and a girl distracting the Minotaur. My jaw almost dropped when I realized that it was me and Percy.

Above the images right in the center of the door was a name scrawled in Ancient Greek. I focused on the words and figured out what they said a moment later.

_Annabeth Chase (Jackson)_

I blinked. Annabeth Chase? Who on earth was that? I re-read the words several times to figure it out. Annabeth Chase (Jackson). My name was Annabeth Jackson. But what was the word Chase doing in there? I knew for a fact that my name was _not_ Annabeth Chase. I noticed that the word Jackson looked new too. Like it had been scrawled on in brackets at the same time the image of me, Percy and the Minotaur had been carved on the door. I started to wonder if there was a way to get rid of the word Chase and just leave it as Annabeth Jackson because I didn't really like a door that had my name wrong.

Reaching out, I placed my hand on the bronze doorknob and turned it to open the door. I gave a last wary look at the words Annabeth Chase before pushing the door open all the way and walking inside. It was nice. And by nice I mean _really_ nice. The bed looked like an exact copy from my one at home only without Smelly Gabe's smell and without any mess or dirt. It even had a nicer frame around it. There was a beige carpet on the floor that felt softer than any of the others and the smell of my mom lingered in the room but with those little extras. For instance, I couldn't remember my mom smelling of cinnamon or honey. She just smelled of every other nice thing in the world.

There was a small bookshelf in the corner and a bedside table on the left of the bed. A window was on the wall on the left side of the room and I walked over to it. On the left side was the Ares cabin which was on the other side of the blue force field. It wasn't a pretty sight to see and if I focused hard enough I could make out the forms of some of the Ares kids who hadn't gone to sleep and were moving around inside their cabin. They were probably talking about me and Percy. I moved over to the other window which was directly across from the first one and saw the Apollo cabin. It had looked like it was made of solid gold when in the sunlight but now it looked like an ordinary cabin.

There was a chest of drawers and a walk in wardrobe that I just had to check out. I mean, I absolutely detest going clothes shopping and being interested in my appearance as every geek in the world is like that but I didn't want to wake up one day and find I either didn't have anything to wear or had a dress in there. When i looked inside I was pleasantly surprised. There wasn't a dress in sight, or any skirts for that matter, but the wardrobe wasn't empty either. There were t-shirts, long sleeved shirts, trousers, three quarter lengths and three baseball caps. There were even two pairs of shoes in there. Trainers and boots. I decided that I liked whoever had picked these things out for me since if what Chiron said was true then everything in Cabin 7# belonged to me.

I closed the wardrobe and walked over to the bed. On top of the pillows was a pair of blue pajamas covered in little white owls. On the duvet was a book entitled, '_Instructions_'. I picked it up straight away and skimmed through it. Everything you needed to know about Cabin 7# was in there and even instructions on how to get other people through the force field. Apparently nobody could cross through unless I concentrated really, really hard so that I wouldn't let someone in accidentally. It seemed like a good design feature to me. It also had a note tucked inside of it that read, '_Pajamas__ are required for sleeping on all nights. Even the first._' I knew that it meant that I had to sleep in the pajamas that had been left on top of the blue pillow with the white pillow underneath it.

There was another part just underneath the first message. '_Lights out at ten thirty. No later._' I didn't miss the underlying warning of 'or else' after it and put the note back inside the book. There was a clock on the bedside table and it said that the time was just after ten. I had spent a long time looking around and I was already exhausted. I closed the instructions book and set it down on the bedside table for me to read tomorrow, picked up the pajamas and got changed in the bathroom were there was only one really small window at the top of the wall. I wasn't even tall enough to look out of it yet.

I walked back into the bedroom and saw that the curtains had pulled themselves closed. The lights in the room were still on and I guessed that the light switch downstairs must have turned them all on. There was a light switch on the wall in the bedroom too and as I pressed it every light in the house went out. I had an idea and thought in my head that I only wanted the lights in the bedroom on. When I pressed the switch the lights in the bedroom came on and no others did. I pressed the switch again and they went off. It was really cool and I found myself wondering just how many impossible things were in this cabin.

With a yawn I decided that it was probably best if I just went to sleep now. Chiron had said outside that Athena did a check to see if her missing child was healthy and safe and that if that child was claimed but never checked over then her wrath would be brought down on the camp. I didn't want to get anyone hurt because of me and even though I didn't believe that I was the missing child of Athena I had to admit that the idea wouldn't have been nearly as disturbing if I had a godly father instead of a godly mother. Now things were just complicated and I found myself wondering if any of this could be true. My mother, Sally Jackson, couldn't lie to me or Percy. It wasn't in her nature. I knew that something was going on.

I slowly drew back the covers to check I wouldn't accidentally be laying on anything in the night. There was nothing there other than the white bed sheet covering the mattress. After double checking, I got into bed and pulled the covers up over to me to fight away the sudden chill of the cold. The bed was really comfortable. I felt like I could fall asleep right there if I just put my head on the pillow and I figured out once I did put my head on the pillows that I had to fight to stay awake. My yawning became more frequent and after ten seconds I just gave up and decided that sleep was the easier option for me.

It took a few moments for me to convince myself to relax and get some sleep but it worked in the end. I always found it hard to get to sleep thanks to my ADHD but exhaustion was usually the key that made it happen. Even months ago when me and Percy had been at Yancy Academy it had taken a good argument and fight between us just so we had the ability to get to sleep. I sunk down into the bed like it was made of the most comfortable foam on the planet and my eye lids began to droop as I drifted off into a peaceful sleep. That was something I had never had since my mother was killed by the Minotaur.

I thought of my family. I thought of Percy, my twin brother who people were trying to take away from me when he was the one thing I had left. We only had each other. I didn't know what I'd do if I didn't have Percy and he would be in tatters if he didn't have me. Losing everything you have has a huge effect on a person and losing our mother was almost the exact same thing. I often wonder how demi-gods at Camp Half-Blood don't fall into depression because of what they've lost. Their normal lives. Their safety in the outside worlds. Some of them stay at camp all year round because they really have lost everything they owned before they found out the truth. I stopped thinking about it then because it was just absurd to think that Percy wasn't family. He was. And our mother was too.

Right before I fell asleep I thought I'd caught sight of a woman appearing in the room wearing a white Greek toga. She had an expression on her face that was a mixture of protectiveness, curiosity and happiness. My eyes closed after that and I fell into the sleeping state where you weren't in a deep sleep but you were still asleep. I could feel someone gently running their hand through my blonde hair but when you're asleep you don't really think any of that is real once you wake up. I didn't realize that it really was real and that my nightmare was actually a rather good thing. Or that I still had a mother who cared about me more than anything who _hadn't_ been killed by the Minotaur.


	10. A Quest Is Given

**Hidden Away**

**Disclaimer: I own nothing, all credit goes to the owner/creator of Percy Jackson. **

**Summary: Cursed so that Athena can never sense her, Annabeth is constantly attacked by monsters. At age three she was found in an alleyway by Sally Jackson and grew up as Percy's 'twin' sister. When the lighting bolt is stolen Athena slowly begins to ****realize**** that the demi-god helping Jackson is actually her own daughter. **

_**A Quest Is Given, Percy Jackson**_

Early the next morning I was moved to cabin three. That meant there was only one cabin separating me from Cabin 7#. I now had another reason to hate the Ares cabin more than I already did. I managed to get in a little bit of sleep before there was a very loud pounding noise at my door. There were hammocks in cabin three and I almost fell out of the one I was occupying when I was awoken abruptly. I stood up, muttering about how you could never get any decent sleep in a summer camp, and walked over to the door. I had barely unlocked it when it was shoved open by someone on the other side. Soon after I saw that it was Malcolm and the Athena kids.

"Can I help -"

"Cut the pleasantries Jackson we're here on business." Malcolm interrupted me harshly. "We want to know what's going on."

"What do you mean, what's going on?" I asked in confusion. "And what are you talking about?"

"Annabeth!" He shouted like it was the most obvious thing in the world. "She's the missing child of Athena! I don't know why we didn't see it sooner. She has blonde hair, grey eyes and she's too smart to be related to you."

"Gee thanks," I bit out. "But I really don't have time for this. Annabeth is my sister, my _twin_ sister and there's nothing you or anyone else is going to do about that. I'm sure that as soon as Chiron and Mr. D explain things to us everything will sort itself out."

"Hades trousers, Jackson. You really don't know what's going on here do you? Of course you're going to believe that she's your twin sister! The rivalry between Athena and Poseidon passed down to you two and growing up believing you were siblings has just given it something to manifest into! There is no sibling rivalry for you two. You are not twins. None of the gods could sense who Annabeth was and that's why it was so easy for the two of you to believe because there was no-one to tell you otherwise! You're mother -"

"Our mother is the best person in the world," I hissed as I lost my temper. "And if what you say is true then that means she took Annabeth in even though she knew that she was a demi-god too. Now go away or I'll make you."

"Look here Jackson, we -"

"Oi! Malcolm!" A voice called and the Athena kids turned around to see Grover standing there looking annoyed. "Get lost! Percy's got a trip to the Big House in a few minutes and unless you want Annabeth to get stuck in Cabin 7# then you'd better get going with your activities for the day. Now."

None of the Athena kids looked happy about it. If anything they looked really, really angry but they walked away all the same. Right past Cabin 7# which they all glanced at as they walked out of the cabin area and towards their activities for the day. Grover came up to me, his goat hooves making sounds as they connected with the wood, and looked me over with a serious eye. He let out a sigh of relief once he was done and I frowned. I had no idea what he was so relieved about when my world was literally being torn down around me again. Now I was going to lose Annabeth too and there was nothing I could do to stop it.

"Thank the gods they didn't hurt you," He said. "They've been up since four trying to get through the force field on Cabin 7# but it wouldn't budge. Chiron had to lock them in their cabin until seven when they were allowed out."

"What do you mean?" I asked. "Why were they trying to get to Cabin 7#?"

"To see Annabeth," Grover explained. "They've all been so worked up about discovering that she is the lost child of Athena. If I hadn't gotten here when I did and you had refused to tell them anything about Annabeth then they would have attacked you. I can only imagine how Athena herself feels if that was how her children reacted."

"Grover, I don't know anything about how Annabeth got through that force field," I said. "And what do you mean by 'I can only imagine how Athena herself feels'?"

"Well, you see Percy, the reactions of the gods when they find out things is about ten times worse than those of their children. Which means that when Athena found out where Annabeth was, who she was and how she'd been living for the past few years of her life then she would have had a reaction ten times worse than her children did."

"But that means Annabeth could be in trouble," I pointed out. "Athena can pass through the force field. She would have gone to see Annabeth."

Grover nodded with a grim looked on his face. "I know, Percy. Chiron and Mr. D wanted her to get to sleep as fast as possible so that she wouldn't have to be awake with Athena around. You don't know how powerful the gods are Percy. Athena would have been near hysterical when Annabeth crossed over into her territory since Camp Half-Blood is neutral territory. That means she could have done anything at all. Even taken Annabeth somewhere."

My eyes widened. "We have to get inside the cabin," I said. "We have to make sure Annabeth is okay."

"We can't Percy. The force field, remember?" Grover replied. "Just come with me. Chiron has a plan to check if Annabeth is inside or not."

I didn't bother to close the door behind me as I followed Grover outside. I'd find out later that it had closed on it's own anyway. As I looked around I realized that there were no other campers in the cabin area. I wondered why they had all gone since there was usually one or two of them around but decided that Chiron or Mr. D had sent them all away and kept following Grover. We stopped just outside Cabin 7# and as close to the force field as we could get without being thrown away. Chiron was stood there with a conch horn in his left hand and when he saw us coming he gave me a sad smile. It was probably meant to be reassuring.

"Percy," He said. "How are you feeling today?"

"Fine," I answered hastily. "Is Annabeth inside?"

"I was just about to check. This horn can wake up a beast as large as a Cyclopes. If Annabeth is inside then she will wake up and come to the see what is going on." Chiron explained.

"Well do it. Please. You have to do it."

Chiron nodded once, brought the horn to his lips and blew. It was as loud as he had said but none of the other campers came back to see what it was. I could have sworn I saw the ground itself shake a little as he blew the conch horn. When he stopped I felt dread build up inside me. Annabeth hadn't come out of the front door. She was gone. But then I heard a familiar voice and my head jerked upwards.

"Percy?" Annabeth asked in a tired voice. She was standing on the balcony of Cabin 7# in blue pajamas that had white owls on them. Her hair which was usually in a rats nest in the mornings was all neat and there was this healthy glow around her.

"Annabeth," I said in relief. "You're okay."

"Yes I'm okay," She said with narrowed and suspicious eyes. "Why wouldn't I be?"

"Because -"

"We'll explain it to you later Annabeth." Grover cut me off. "Did anything happen to you in there? Did you see anyone?"

"No." Annabeth replied, shaking her head. "I didn't see anybody in here with me. How could they get in with the force field there?"

"Just get dressed and come outside, okay? We need to get you and Percy up to the Big House as quickly as possible."

I don't think Annabeth understood why Grover sounded so urgent but she went back inside the cabin and I knew that she was doing as he asked.

"Thank the gods she wasn't taken," Chiron said. "Athena's wisdom has paid off yet again."

"Did either of you notice that Annabeth looked a little... different?" I asked them. "Like there was this kind of glow around her or something."

Chiron nodded. "Athena's blessing," He said. "That means that the goddess came whilst Annabeth was sleeping to check that she was healthy and safe. I suspect that if your sister had been harmed any more than that cut from the hell hound she would have been taken."

"But why? To keep her safe?"

"Yes Percy," Grover answered. "To keep her safe. It's like you were told, when you lose something it becomes even more precious to you. Most blessings from the gods can only be noticed by monsters but since there was a slight glow around Annabeth I'm guessing that this one was powerful."

Chrion nodded in agreement. "Definitely the most powerful one that I have seen for quite some time. I suppose it was the least we could expect considering that Annabeth is still here with us."

"You're talking about this like there are bad things that might happen," I said. "Isn't Annabeth going to be allowed to stay at camp?"

"Of course she's allowed to stay Percy, but Athena can still step in at any moment and take Annabeth right out from under our noses. We need to be careful that her wrath is not brought down upon us. Upon any of us. Offending the other gods means nothing when her instincts are those of a protective mother."

I nodded. That was something that I could understand. Whenever my mother was in her over protective state she was a completely different woman. Jumping at every little thing and not letting me or Annabeth out of her sight for more than half a second. It was slightly annoying at times but I wouldn't ask her to stop doing it for all the money in the world. It felt good to be loved by my mother and I never wanted to lose that. That was why I had come up with a plan that I needed to tell Annabeth about later on. But now that I knew that Athena could come by at any time and just snatch her I wasn't so certain if I should.

A minute later Annabeth came out of her cabin in clothes that I'd never seen before. They suited her really, really well. A long sleeved white shirt with a short sleeved checkered shirt over the top and jeans. She wore the same trainers but they looked whiter and way more cleaner than before. Her hair was done up in a pony tail just like usual but with those clothes on it just looked perfect. Annabeth looked exactly like my sister but with just a few changes that were the exact ones a person would need to make to look as if they were comfortable in their own skin. She walked up to me and straight out of the force field without a moment of hesitation. I guess it only took a little while to get used to things like that.

"What happened to your clothes?" I asked.

She shrugged her shoulders. "I couldn't find them. So I had to use the ones that were in the wardrobe."

"And they fit you perfectly?"

"Well I'm wearing them, aren't I?"

"You two, stop bickering for five minutes. We must get you both to the Big House. Mr. D wishes to speak with you on a very important matter." Chiron said and Grover paled. I started to get a little nervous and Annabeth shifted from one foot to the other which suggested she was a little nervous too.

Chiron led us through the camp and we went the long way to avoid all of the campers. Grover was nervously biting his fingernails and muttering things under his breath that all involved the words 'serious trouble' and 'Athena is going to be so mad'. I was really confused but kept silent and shared a few looks with Annabeth so we both knew that the other was as uncomfortable as we were. I had been up all night thinking about what to expect now that I had been claimed by Poseidon and Annabeth had been claimed by Athena as the missing child. The Big Three weren't supposed to have any children and yet here I was. I guessed that Dionysus was going to vaporize me or something but I had no idea what he was going to do to Annabeth.

When we arrived at the Big House and walked through the doors we found Mr. D sat at a table holding some cards in his hand. There were some other cards floating in the air which suggested that he was playing against an invisible opponent. When he saw us coming he took a casual sip of his Diet Coke and the cards of his invisible opponent sank down to the table. I knew that he would never take this much interest in me, even if it was only a little, so it had to be because of Annabeth. Chiron led us closer and Grover became even more nervous than before. I noticed that Dionysus looked a little shaken up if you focused on him hard enough.

"Well, well," Mr. D said to me and Annabeth. "Our new celebrities."

We both glanced at one another but stayed silent and still.

"Come closer," He said. "Don't expect any royal treatment just because your father is Barnacle Beard and your mother is queen of the owls." There were two loud claps of thunder in the distance that each rivaled each other in their suddenness. "Yes, yes, I know. Blah, blah, blah. Now, if I had my way you, Peter Johnson, would be blasted into molecules and this whole mess would be done with whilst _you_, Annie Johnson, would be handed on a silver plate to Athena so we never have to deal with your troubles again."

"Mr. D," Chiron warned with an uneasy glance at the sky. "Spontaneous combustion is a form of harm and your job is to take care of all campers here at camp."

"It's not harm. The boy won't feel a thing." Mr. D said as he waved his hand in a dismissive gesture. "However, I have agreed to restrain myself. I'm thinking of turning you into one of those bottlenose dolphins and sending you back to your father."

"Mr. D -"

"Alright, alright. There is one other option, however, but it is deadly foolishness. Just like you being here when I return." He rose from his chair. "I must be off to Olympus for an emergency meeting concerning the girl. You can all guess which one." We all glanced at Annabeth who was looking incredibly uneasy. "Chiron, explain to them what they need to know and do it before Athena can try something. Things are getting out of hand up there. Do you know how hard it is to convince the goddess of wisdom that coming down to retrieve her daughter is a bad idea?"

He clicked his fingers after that and became a hologram, then flakey dust that was blown away by the wind. There was silence for a few moments as Annabeth shifted around nervously from one foot to the other and Grover did something similar but much more obvious. His hooves clattered on the floor and his fingernails were now shorter than ever. He was muttering things against his hand as he bit his fingernails but I couldn't make any of it out. Every second he would give Annabeth a glance that was both nervous and fearful. I wondered how they could all be so concerned about Annabeth when I was the kid who wasn't supposed to exist. That was a little selfish but still a valid question.

Chiron turned and smiled at us. "Sit, Percy, Annabeth, Grover, please." We did but it was hesitantly and Grover kept missing the seat on his chair. "Now, tell me, Percy, what did you think of the hell hound?"

I held back a cringe at the name. It scared me so much that I had barely been able to get through the day without imagining how it's claws had ripped through my armour like it was paper and left gashes on my chest that had been disgusting enough to make a girl like Annabeth look away. I sucked it up and decided to tell the truth when Annabeth was in the room for the first time in my life.

"I was scared," I admitted. "If you hadn't shot it then me and Annabeth would be dead right now."

"Not so sure about Annabeth," Grover muttered. "What with Athena's full attention on her..."

"Grover," Chiron warned lightly. "Percy, you will meet far worse before this is done. The hell hound was just the beginning."

"The beginning," Annabeth repeated. "So there are more things out there that are going to try and kill us?"

Chiron nodded. "They will most definitely try to kill you both but I am not sure how far they would get should they try to kill you, Annabeth, especially at a time like this."

"What do you mean?"

"Do you remember the story behind Cabin 7#?" He asked. "Twelve years ago there was a fight on Olympus. Apollo's sun chariot was stolen for seven days and that caused the famous seven day eclipse that you will have learned about in school. It was stolen by Ares himself but he framed Athena for the crime and Apollo cursed her youngest child so that Athena would never be able to sense them. The goddess was outraged at the accusation and fully prepared to start a war if Apollo did not lift the curse so Hera stepped in since she is the goddess of family and did not want a war between them."

"And Athena was exonerated, right?" I questioned. "I mean, they figured out that she hadn't done it?"

Chiron nodded. "You are correct Percy. But it took three years for the anger to die down and for Athena and Apollo to restrain themselves from sending Ares to the pits of Tartarus for what he caused. To make up for what he did, Apollo offered to lift the curse and Zeus granted Athena a pact. For all of the years with her child that she missed the child would be allowed to stay with her wherever she chose. Even on Olympus itself."

"And not be allowed to come back down," Grover added quietly.

Chiron gave him a warning look. "They went to the house that the child had been living up but it was gone. Monsters had been attracted by the double presence of the half blood scent and the curse of Apollo. The child fled and Athena was so distressed that she cursed the father of the child so that he would never be able to see it once it was found. She and Apollo searched for years. Athena to find her child and Apollo because he felt terrible about the whole thing. They never found the child but Apollo was able to ensure that when the child was on death's bed Athena would be able to sense it."

"That's why Cabin 7# was built at camp. They knew that the child would be coming here one day." I guessed.

"Yes," Chiron said. "And Cabin 7# was built between the Ares cabin and the Apollo cabin to overshadow them both and make them look weak. Then a few days ago the two of you were fighting the Minotaur on half blood hill. Percy, you passed through the barriers of the camp without fault. Annabeth, when you did you got stuck in the barrier. Can you make any guesses as to why?"

Annabeth scrunched up her face in thought for a moment. "Does it have something to do with the fact that Zeus' power helped create the borders?"

Chiron nodded. "Zeus' power is greater than Apollo's so when you tried to pass through you got stuck. That was Apollo's curse being ripped off of you by the power that is invested inside of Thalia's tree. When you passed through to the other side all of your energy had been zapped and you collapsed. The wound on your head did not come from the fall. If you take off that band-aid above your left eyebrow you will see the imprint of an owl. The symbol for Athena. That means that _you_ are the child who went missing and somewhere along the line you became a part of the Jackson family. It must have been when you were very young since neither of you had any beliefs that you were not twins."

"But we are twins," I protested. "We _are_ brother and sister."

"Yes, in a lot of ways you are." Chiron agreed. "In every way except for one you are. And that way is that you are not directly related through blood. You are related, yes, but not as closely as you believe."

"That's not possible," Annabeth said firmly. "Percy is my twin brother and that's that. There are no complications or problems or _anything else_."

"I agree with Annabeth." I said.

Chiron sighed. "I will not try to explain this to you. I have already explained about the curse and why it was placed upon Annabeth. Now I will explain that situation that led to the discovery you two have made about you being half bloods and the taking of your mother."

There was a loud clap of thunder in the distance.

"What I meant to say was, _Percy's_ biological mother and Annabeth's _adoptive_ mother." Chiron corrected himself. "As I was saying, many monsters will try to kill you both before you are done."

"Done?" I questioned.

"Yes, when you have completed your quest. That is, if you will accept it Percy? And take Annabeth with you?"

Grover had his fingers crossed under the table and I glanced at Annabeth. "Um, maybe I should know what the quest is first _before_ I chose to take it or not?"

"Ah, yes, you see that is the hard part. Details."

"Poseidon and Zeus," I said. "They're fighting over something. Some valuable... the thing that was stolen..."

Chiron and Grover exchanged worried looks. "How do you know that Percy?" Chiron asked me.

"Well, the weather has been really weird since Christmas and there have been all of these freak accidents and... I've been having these dreams too."

"Knew it," Grover said under his breath.

"Hush satyr,"

"But it _is_ his quest! It must be if he's having dreams about it!"

"Hold on," Annabeth said. "If this is Percy's quest then why am I involved?"

Chiron sighed. "Because, child, it doesn't look good in a time such as this to discover that the children of Poseidon and Athena who should hate each other have been living under the same roof all this time. Zeus was already suspicious of you before and then when you were both openly claimed I expect that he is now beyond a little paranoid. That is why the two of you working together to end this is the best peace offering there is. The two are having their worst quarrel in centuries over something valuable that was stolen. A lightning bolt."

I laughed nervously. "A _what_?"

"Lightning bolts can't be stolen," Annabeth said. "They are caused by fluctuations in the weather. How can you steal that?"

"I am not talking about those kinds of lightning bolts," Chiron said. "I am talking about a two-foot-long cylinder of pure celestial bronze with godly explosives on the end."

"You mean the one that was used to sheer the top off Mount Ethna and topple Kronos from his throne?" Annabeth asked.

I gave her a questioning look. "How do you know all of this?"

"How do you not know all of this?"

"Quiet," Chiron said. "It is missing."

"Stolen?"

"By who?" I asked.

"By _whom_, Percy." Chiron corrected. "By _you_."

I gaped and Annabeth face palmed. "Why can you never keep yourself out of trouble Percy?" She asked in exasperation. "I leave you alone when I'm unconscious and you get into trouble with campers. I leave you alone at Christmas and you get yourself accused of stealing Zeus' master bolt."

"Hey!" I protested. "I didn't steal it! How could I of? Neither of us even knew that we were demi-gods at Christmas. We were with our mom." There was a clap of thunder in the distance. "Why does that keep happening?" I asked.

"Athena does not appreciate Sally Jackson being mentioned as Annabeth's biological mother," Chiron explained. "Just try to avoid mentioning it in that way."

"But -"

"There are more important things to worry about." Chiron interrupted. "Gods cannot take symbols of power from themselves so Zeus believes that your father used a human hero to do it. Zeus had good reason to suspect Poseidon because of the Cyclopes forges which are located under the sea so Poseidon does have influence over them. He believes that many copies are being made so that Poseidon can topple Zeus from his throne and take control of Olympus. At first Zeus was not certain but then Poseidon openly claimed you Percy. Athena claimed you Annabeth. Zeus is no fool and knows that if Annabeth was involved then Athena would know nothing about it due to the curse but as for you Percy... well, Zeus thinks he has found his thief."

"But that's insane! I've never even been to Olympus before and I don't know where it is!" I said. "Plus, for the whole of the winter holidays I was with my mom and Annabeth."

"That's true," Annabeth admitted. "You were like one of those infections that just doesn't go away."

I scowled at her.

"But you could have snuck off whilst she was sleeping," Chiron pointed out. "Or so Zeus thinks. It is likely that they researched into your backgrounds once the two of you were claimed to discover your location at the time of the theft and you were both in New York. Both of the gods have inflamed tempers and neither one will back down. The world will be in ruin should war break out and Zeus has set a deadline for the return of the bolt. The summer solstice. Should the bolt not be returned by that time then there will most certainly be war and you will never see each other again."

"You mean because we'll be dead?" Annabeth asked.

"No, because Athena and Poseidon will take you both to their places of safety to protect you from the wrath of the other gods." Chiron explained. "You don't want that do you?"

We shook our heads.

"So we have to find this bolt and give it back to Zeus in time for the summer solstice?" I asked.

"Yes. In ten days time."

"But where would we even start looking for something like the master bolt? Anyone could have taken it."

"I have an idea of where it might be... part of a prophecy years ago but... well, you must officially take up this quest before I can say more. You must seek the counsel of the Oracle."

"Who's the Oracle?" Annabeth asked. "A prophet?"

"Of sorts, yes."

"Why can't you tell me beforehand?" I asked.

"Because telling you the supposed location might scare you too much and then you would not take up the quest."

I swallowed. "That sounds like a good reason."

"You agree with me then?"

"Okay," I said. "It's much better than being turned into a dolphin or not being allowed to see my own sister again."

"Then it is time you consulted the Oracle," Chiron said. "Go upstairs to the attic. When you come back down we shall talk some more, assuming that you are the same as you were before you went up there."

"Don't get your hopes up," Annabeth mumbled.

"It's just an attic!" I exclaimed. "It's not like I'm going to turn into some weird kind of toad by going up there."

"No, that would be huge improvement." Annabeth said with a smirk.

I glared back at her as I stood and left the room.

There were four flights of stairs leading upwards and at then I came to a stop underneath a green trap door that was dusty and slowly decaying. I could smell the warm air that carried rotten wood and mildew with it. Those were the things that indicated one thing to me. That along with the next smell made me tense up. Snakes. That was the smell of snakes. Me and Annabeth aren't exactly fond of snakes although I am more scared of them than Annabeth since she had about twenty thousand spiders in New York going from home to home with a personal grudge against her. Luckily for me I haven't managed to anger any snakes yet but that's not to say they won't try to eat me.

I decided to be brave and climbed up. The attic was filled with loads of Greek hero stuff that seemed like junk to me but I was sure that Annabeth would be able to spend days in here and not get bored. There were armour stands covered in cobwebs, which let me rethink the whole Annabeth loving the attic thing, shields that were covered with rust, swords and other weapons that had dents and breaks in them and little things like wristwatches that seemed meaningless to me. In the centre of the attic was a table covered in all of these jarred and pickled things. There were eyes and claws and horns and other parts of monsters. I stopped looking at those things then and spotted the worst thing in the attic sat on a stool by the window.

It was a mummy and yet not a mummy. It wore a sun dress, had long black hair, beads around it's neck and a headband over the hair. It's skin was thin and leathery like Mrs. Dodds wings only older and wrinkled. The eyes were white slits that were by no means real in my book and just the sight of her made me want to turn and run because of how many chills it sent up my back. That was all _before_ she sat up on her stool and the creepy green mist poured out of her opened mouth. I almost tripped over my own feet trying to get to the trapdoor so I could tell Chiron there was no way I was staying up here alone but it slammed shut and I knew that there was no getting out of here yet.

Anyway, even if I had gotten out there would be nobody to come up here with me. Grover is scared of everything that isn't normal so this... _thing_ would have definitely creeped him out more than me, Chiron is half horse so he could never have been able to make it into the attic in the first place and there were spiders up here so that ruled out Annabeth. They might catch sight of her and spread the word to the spiders back in New York that they'd found their number one enemy and then I'd be beaten up for suggesting it and then beaten up again just because Annabeth needed someone to take her rage out on. I probably wouldn't be allowed to talk to her for a week after that either.

A voice began to speak in my head. _I am the spirit of Delphi, speaker of the prophecies of Phoebus Apollo, slayer of the mighty Phython. Approach, seeker, and ask. _

I took a deep breath and nearly choked when all the dust got caught in my throat. I punched my chest a few times to get my breathing back on track and got up the courage to ask this mummy my question. It had to be phrased just right in my mind so I asked the one thing I'd always wanted to know.

"What is my destiny?"

The green mist churned and turned into the images of Smelly Gabe and his pals. I didn't even bother to look at them and just listened to the voice as it spoke.

_You shall go west and face the god who has turned. You shall find what was stolen and see it safely returned. You shall be betrayed by one who calls you a friend. And you shall fail to save what matters most in the end._

A thousand questions ran through my head at once. Who was going to betray me? Which friend? What did it mean by I was going to fail to save what matters most in the end? And the god who has turned? What did that mean? I really wanted to ask them all but I realized that talking to a mummy for longer than was necessary was the stupidest idea in the world and that my twin sister was waiting for me downstairs. If I was going to be betrayed by a friend then that meant that she might be in danger too. I rushed over to the trapdoor and flung it open without any resistance. Then I jumped down from the attic to go downstairs. My audience with the Oracle had just about ended.

"Well?" Chiron asked as I practically flung myself down into the chair beside Annabeth.

"She said that I would go to the west and retrieve what was stolen," I said. "And face the god who has turned."

"Knew it," Grover said as he munched on a Diet Coke can.

"Anything else, Percy?" Chiron questioned, leaning forwards slightly.

"No, that was it." I lied as the words ran through my head again and again. "She didn't mention anything about Annabeth though so I guess that's a good sign."

"Or a bad one," Grover added. "It means that we don't know what her fate is going to be although it's fairly obvious that she's not going to die anytime soon thanks to Athena."

"I'm still in the room you know," Annabeth pointed out.

"Do not dwell on the words of the Oracle for long, Percy. They often have hidden double meanings," Chiron warned me. "The truth is never truly revealed until the events have taken place."

"Okay, so where do I go? Where do we go to find the lightning bolt?" I asked. "And who is this god in the west?"

"You need to think Percy," Chiron said.

"That's not going to happen." Annabeth muttered.

"Shut up." I whispered.

"If Zeus and Poseidon are at war with one another then who stands to gain?" Chiron continued.

"Somebody else who wants to take over?" I guessed.

"Hades," Annabeth said. "He's the other one of the Big Three and he was scammed by Zeus after they defeated Kronos so he ended up with the underworld. He would have a huge grudge against him and Poseidon."

"Very good Annabeth," Chiron praised. "The Lord of the Underworld is the only possibility."

Grover choked on his Diet Coke can. "Hold on... what?"

"A fury came after Percy and Annabeth," Chiron reminded him.

"Yeah, but Annabeth's no child of Poseidon. She's -"

"Someone who's been put in enough circumstances so it _looks like _she's a child of Poseidon. The fury watched them both until it was sure that they were the children of Poseidon and even the gods themselves made that mistake. All of the gods. And furies only obey one lord: Hades."

"But Hades hates _all _heroes. Especially Percy since he's the son of Poseidon." Grover protested.

"True, Grover, but let us not forget the hell hound. It was summoned from the fields of punishment and went after _both_ of them when Apollos curse would have been removed by the magic of Thalia's tree." Chiron reminded him.

"If all of Apollo's curse had been removed then Athena would have claimed Annabeth straight away," Grover protested.

"Curses leave behind remnants, Grover, and there will always be a part of it in Annabeth's blood unless that blood is lost." Chiron said. "Hades' mistake is proof that he wanted all chances of Poseidon clearing his name destroyed. He must have a spy here at camp too since hell hounds can only be summoned from someone within. It is very unlikely that he knows that Annabeth is the missing child of Athena yet but that does not matter. He wants all chances of this war being stopped eradicated and I am one hundred percent certain that if Percy was killed then Annabeth would avenge him and the other way around."

"Sad but true." Annabeth agreed quietly so that only I could hear..

"But -"

"I do not pretend to understand the Lord of the Dead or his motives but he sent a minion to steal the master bolt knowing that Zeus would blame Poseidon," Chiron insisted. "And now two more pieces have come into play," Here he gestured to me and Annabeth. "Whom can exonerate Poseidon and he has already tried thrice to kill them. That is all the proof we need. Percy must go to the underworld, find the master bolt and reveal the truth to the other gods."

"What about Annabeth?" I asked. "Can't she come too? It's not like I'm going to leave her here with everyone whispering to one another and trying to get her on her own."

"A hero is allowed to take people on a quest with them. The number of three has always been sacred for quests so you may take two companions with you." Chiron said.

"I'm taking Annabeth," I said without hesitation. "And Grover. You too buddy."

"What?" Grover perked up at once. "No, no, no. Percy, this is the _underworld_. The place were all souls go when they die. The place where -"

He went on into a rant about the underworld and the danger within it. I tried my best to keep up but wasn't having much luck. Annabeth, on the other hand, wasn't even bothering to listen. She was staring at one of the legs of her chair and had the 'face' on again. I knew she was thinking hard.

"The place where all souls go when they die," She repeated quietly. "Mom..."

Grover was coming to the end of his rant. "... satyrs and underground places do not mix and... and..." He took a deep breath and looked at me. "I owe you a life debt so... if you're serious about this..."

"Oh, Grover, you don't have to come if you don't want too." I said quickly.

"No, no, it's okay... I'm still your protector... in a way... and losing the two of you would end my hopes of a future. I guess we're all off to Los Angeles then." He said.

"Los Angeles?"

"That's where the entrance to the underworld is." Chiron explained. "But just to be on the safe side you should pack equipment and Annabeth definitely needs to go back to Cabin 7# before leaving."

"Why?" She asked.

"Because giving Athena a minute to realize that you are going on a quest to the underworld instead of her finding out when you are actually there minimizes the possibilities of you getting taken away."


	11. I Get A Visit From My Real Mum

**Hidden Away**

**Disclaimer: I own nothing, all credit goes to the owner/creator of Percy Jackson. **

**Summary: Cursed so that Athena can never sense her, Annabeth is constantly attacked by monsters. At age three she was found in an alleyway by Sally Jackson and grew up as Percy's 'twin' sister. When the lighting bolt is stolen Athena slowly begins to ****realize**** that the demi-god helping Jackson is actually her own daughter. **

_**I Get A Visit From My Real Mum, Annabeth Jackson (Chase)**_

I really did not want to go back to Cabin 7# after what I'd been told. Like, I really, really, _really_ didn't want to go back inside the territory of my godly parent for a few very pressing reasons. But I just settled for one. She could take me away to wherever she wanted and whenever she wanted if I either wasn't safe, was injured or she just felt that she wanted to. You can probably see by now that these were all extremely good reasons for me trying to steer clear of the cabin I'd spent the night in. I could barely feel comfortable around there anymore since my biological mother had actually came in the night whilst I was sleeping to check I was okay. It didn't seem like something a person would do to check if you were okay to me.

Nevertheless, I had literally no other option. It was either go back into the cabin to get ready before leaving so that Athena knew I was leaving or not go back into the cabin or get pulled away right in the middle of the quest and leave Percy and Grover to die. I wasn't so sure that me leaving would actually be the cause of their deaths so I tried to get out of it but when you had a centaur flanking you there was nothing a person could do but accept it. Chiron left me and Percy once we got to the cabin area and Percy ran straight for cabin three whilst I just walked towards Cabin 7# feeling grim and really nervous.

I got within about ten feet of the force field before I got stopped by a hand on my shoulder that pulled me around to face that camper who's hand it belonged to. Chiron said not to bother waiting for all the campers to clear out of the cabin area this time because then the quest would take forever to get started with all of the time it took. I was fairly certain he had gotten that part wrong because I was now standing face to face with the members of the Athena cabin who had all sprinted towards me the moment my face showed in the cabin area. You know, I always knew that trusting a horse was something of a bad idea.

"_You_," Malcolm said with his hand still on my shoulder. "Are going to tell us everything. Now."

I blinked at him. "What?" I asked.

"Tell us everything," He repeated. "Why you went missing, how you managed to end up being the twin of the Son of Poseidon and why you didn't tell us."

"Well I didn't tell you because I didn't know," I said. "But I don't know the answers to the other two questions. Sorry."

"You must know the answers," A different Athena camper insisted. "You don't get a cabin like that for nothing. And we know that our mother came to see you, so -"

"Hang on, I didn't actually _see_ her all that much. I was asleep when she checked me over and just about to fall asleep when she first arrived so I don't have a very clear image of her if that's what you think. In fact, I just found out that if I'm not in that cabin soon she's going to take me away to some unknown location and probably keep me there. So you might want to let me get on with stuff and we'll talk at dinner or something." I lied, knowing that at dinner I was not going to be in camp at all.

Without waiting for an answer, I turned around and speed walked to Cabin 7#. I passed right through the blue shield without a problem and I caught sight of some of the gaping undetermined campers in the Hermes cabin as I walked through the force field. I decided not to pay them any attention until I had an actual explanation for them to remember before they started gawking at me like some sort of fish. When I opened the door and closed it behind me I was fully prepared to just turn around and walk upstairs to pack a bag or something when I heard a voice speak from inside.

"I hope you weren't planning to wear your shoes in the cabin."

I spun around so fast I whacked my head on the door frame and muttered a colourful curse under my breath that was hardly above a whisper. There was a woman standing just a little ways in front of my with a long white toga on, a wreath in her long and curly brown hair and stormy grey eyes that matched mine perfectly. In these situations you had to be really smart to figure out who this was and that was pretty much how you could describe me so I figured out fairly quickly that this was my biological mother. Her arms were crossed and she didn't look at all happy that I'd just muttered a curse word in front of her that someone my age probably shouldn't even know.

"Uh," I said stupidly. "No?"

Her eyes narrowed and I knew I'd done something wrong. I just wasn't sure what it was yet. This was completely different to what my life had been like with my adoptive mother and I wasn't too sure if this one was going to be enjoyable or not.

"You are planning to go on a quest to retrieve the master bolt," She stated. "I cannot allow you to go."

I blinked. "Why not?"

"Because you will get yourself killed," She said like she literally _knew_ I was going to get myself killed. "You and that Jackson boy."

"You mean my brother." I corrected.

Her eyes got really stormy then and I decided never to venture into that sort of territory ever again.

"He is not your _brother_," Athena said clearly. "He is the son of Poseidon. The fact that you have grown up in his household is a mere complication that you will soon forget."

I was starting to get a little offended. I'll admit that growing up with Percy as my brother wasn't all it could have been but still this was my family we were talking about. My idiot of a brother who I loved to humiliate but loved more than anything just like my mother Sally Jackson. This goddess clearly didn't understand how much I cared about the people whom I considered family.

"Why would I forget the people who raised me? Percy is my twin brother and Sally is my mother -"

There was a loud booming of thunder up above but I couldn't bring myself to feel guilty about striking _that_ particular nerve. I did think of Sally Jackson as my one and only mother.

"That woman," She hissed without mentioned her name. "Is _not_ your mother."

"She's good enough for me."

"What you think is besides the point," She said a little harshly. "You cannot expect me to let you stay with the family of _Poseidon_, of all people, when there is a war about to break out because of him."

"He didn't get Percy to steal the bolt," I protested. "I would know if Percy had it. He's the worst liar I've ever met and I was with him for the time when the bolt was stolen."

"He could have gone when you were sleeping."

"Yes but -"

"That means there is a chance that he has the bolt," Athena interrupted me. "And that he is merely going on this quest to retrieve his mother from the underworld."

"Well, if that is true, then I'm still going with him. I don't care if she's my biological mother or not because she's the only mother I've ever known. And since I never knew anything about you or my real dad, whoever _he_ is, then I'm not exactly going to pass up an opportunity to save the family that I love."

"They are not your real family."

"I just said that I don't care -"

"Why would you want to stay with them when you have a step-father as disgusting as yours at the place you call home?" Athena asked and this time she struck a nerve for me. "He abuses your intelligence to win money that he spends to fuel his alcohol addiction whilst barely anything goes to that woman."

"Well, so long as she gets something I'm happy to help my mom out."

"_Step mother."_

"Anyway, why do you care about my life or not? I don't really know a lot about the gods just yet but considering that none of the kids here get visits very often then I'm guessing that you don't really care all that much."

"I visit all of my children," Athena insisted with narrowed eyes. "But none of them are in such a complicated situation as you are."

"How is it complicated? I got cursed and ended up living with the son of Poseidon. What's complicated about that?"

"It is complicated because the master bolt has been stolen and it has just been discovered that there were _two_ powerful half-bloods living under the blessing of Poseidon who could have easily stolen the bolt."

"You don't seriously think that a kid like Percy could have stolen the bolt do you? He can't tell up from down if he's tired enough."

"No, it's you who is smart enough to steal something like the master bolt."

"So now you're accusing me?"

"Did I say that?"

"No, but -"

"Then don't jump to conclusions," Athena interrupted me _again_. "How much do you love this 'family' of yours?"

"Huh?" I asked, surprised by the change of subject. "A lot, I guess. I wouldn't have risked my life to save them if I didn't."

"And you absolutely refuse to listen to any of my warnings?"

"Absolutely," I agreed without pause. It was the first sane thing I'd heard her say so far.

"Then I will let you go," She said suddenly. I was so shocked my jaw almost dropped as if on hinges. "But there is one condition." She added and I was inwardly cursing over and over again. Why hadn't I seen that coming? "You must agree to certain terms that I set."

I arched both eyebrows in surprise. This wasn't the bluntness that I was expecting. "Okay," I said slowly. "What are the terms?"

"You must not allow that step-father of yours to stay in your home any more."

"I can definitely live with that."

"And you need to set a time with your adoptive mother, once you find her again, for when you switch houses for six months."

I was confused. "What do you mean?"

"A contract was made when you went missing that says that for every year of your life that I missed you get to stay with me," Athena informed me and my eyes went wide with shock. "And that means I have twelve years left."

"Twelve..." I repeated quietly, going through things in my brain at top speed. "But that would mean twenty-four years if I only spend six months with you each year and then six months with my other mom."

"_Adoptive_ mother." She reminded me.

"Fine, my adoptive mother, then." I corrected myself. "Does that mean I get to stay with her for the first six months after me and Percy bring her back?"

"If you are able to bring her back from the underworld then yes, you may spend the first six months with her." Athena agreed. "Now what are you going to pack for your quest?"

"Um..." I thought for a moment. "I was thinking the essentials and then that was it."

"No weapons or magical items?"

"I don't have any of my own."

"Then you didn't plan ahead very well."

I fought the urge to roll my eyes since that would probably start another argument. This mother was _definitely_ harder for me to live with than the one who had raised me to the age of twelve.

You remember what I said earlier about this mother being way more difficult for me to live with? Well it turns out that if you don't set her off in any way then Athena is actually quite a good mother. We never left the cabin, obviously, and since me, Percy and Grover weren't leaving for a good few hours I really wasn't that worried about getting things done quickly. I had absolutely no magical items at this point in time since I was new to the whole half-blood thing but I got one really quickly. Athena said it was an early birthday present because I was going on a quest and there was no chance she was letting me go without a magical item for help. So I was completely fine with the idea.

The item in question is a Yankees baseball cap that turns the wearer invisible. I was really sceptical at first but once I put it on and realized that I was invisible I was in love with the cap. I was just thinking of all the fun I could have with it. I could get back at Percy whenever he pranked me and he would never know I was there. Of course I never said these things out loud and just thanked her with a huge smile on my face but you could tell what was going on in my mind. The whole packing for a quest thing wasn't nearly as bad as I'd thought it would be when my mother was helping me. I had always known that mother's tried to take control of everything but mine seemed perfectly happy to let me get on with it. The only thing she did was comment at times and help me out when I was having problems.

And then came the nagging part. I didn't have any weapons of my own, which I had momentarily forgotten, and I was leaving without having eaten any breakfast. At first I thought she might be joking but she really wasn't. It was just like something my other mother Sally Jackson would tell me to do before I left the house with Percy for a trip but without the weapons part. So, I got a celestial bronze sword and dagger from my mom and was made to eat the breakfast that she chose for me. Now I am really protective of my food choices. I grew up with a pig after all (the pig being Percy) and you learn a lot from that kind of influence. But I dare you to try arguing with a god and coming out on top. I lost so badly that I was glaring all the way through breakfast at whatever was closest to me.

I wasn't happy about having my food chosen for me but I have to admit that it did give me way more energy than I'd expected. I never said that out loud though. Can you imagine how stupid I would have to be to admit that my own mother was right about something? Not happening. Not in this half-bloods lifetime. Then she said that Percy, whom she would only refer to as the son of Poseidon and nothing else, would be ready in another hour and that left one hour for us to do something together. I knew it was the whole mother daughter bonding thing that my adoptive mother had always bugged me about and tried to get out of it but once again I failed. Why? Because you can't argue with a god. Although lord knows that I tried.

Now I really wouldn't be telling you this under any other circumstances but I lost argument after argument until we ended up watching a TV documentary together with my head on my mothers lap and her running her hands through my hair. It sounds _really strange_ when I describe it but in some households it would be considered normal. It certainly was for me with my adoptive mother but this was one I'd known for only a little bit of time and argued with the moment we met. I decided to avoid further embarrassment and just accept that this was actually happening. So for the next hour I learned that Chiron and Grover had a very good reason to be afraid of Athena's reaction because this was certainly an over reaction in my book. I could only imagine what this would be like on a daily basis if she took me away for a full _twelve years_ or more.

As embarrassing as my situation was I really had to admit to myself that this felt rather normal after a few seconds. It was the memories of my other family that had me feeling like I could die right then but other than that I was rather happy with where I was. I could have sworn I fell asleep several times for a series of minutes but I could never tell unless I looked up and saw Athena looking happier than before or not. And I never looked up unless curiosity got the better of me. So, after I'd been beaten at every argument, watched a documentary on mythology that I was sure my mother already knew word for word and learned more about the monsters that I was going to face outside of camp the hour was up and I was free.

I got my backpack slung over one shoulder instead of two, because I wasn't a nerd, and had my baseball cap in my pocket. The other one was in my wardrobe upstairs since it was common sense to know that magic invisibility baseball caps triumphed over normal baseball caps. Then right before my mother disappeared into thin air she said goodbye and kissed me on the forehead. That made me freeze so fast I might have been a statue for years. If you'd walked in you would have seen me stood as still as possible in an empty front room staring at the wall in the distance blankly. I know that Athena is the goddess of wisdom and all but you had to be stupid to think that I would just accept something that my other mother would do from her in a heartbeat. It wasn't going to happen for a little while at any rate.

I heard Percy shouting my name from outside and snapped out of my frozen state. My mind immediately pushed that problem right to the bottom of my list of issues right now. I know that it was something most people would wonder about for a long, long time but Percy was still my twin brother and I honestly couldn't care less about my godly parent when he and the woman I would always consider my mother were involved. Turning around, I opened the door to my cabin and walked out with it closing automatically behind me. I didn't know that I had the dual blessings of both Athena and Poseidon on me right then. Poseidon because I had lived with his mortal family for years and Athena for the most obvious of reasons.

"Annabeth," Percy smiled as I walked through the force field with ease to stand beside him. He had a back pack slung over one of his shoulders too. "How'd your packing go?"

"Fine." I answered and decided not to tell Percy about the deal that Athena had made for me. Six months with her and six months with Percy and our mother... How was I going to explain that? I'd wait until we got our mother back and we _would_ get our mother back no matter what.

"Hey, look what I got," Percy dug his hand into his pocket and pulled out a familiar ballpoint pen.

I raised one eye brow. "A pen," I said bluntly. "Why do you have that? You can barely even write."

Percy glared at me. "No, Chiron explained it to me. It's called Riptide and when you click it it turns into a sword. Remember? Like the one I used when we killed Mrs. Dodds." He gave me a smug smile. "Got a magic item before you did, sis."

I couldn't take it. I just couldn't take it. I'm sorry but when my brother challenges me with the whole 'I got something before you' thing then there is nothing in this world that will stop me from showing him up. And that's what I did when I pulled my Yankee's baseball cap out of my pocket with a cocky smirk on my face that was the expression I used whenever I was going to thrash him in an argument. That made him cautious for a start.

"That's not the same cap you had on earlier," Percy said. "Where'd you get it?"

"I got a visitor," I answered and Percy went pale.

"You don't mean that... You actually saw Athena in there?" His eyes went wide. "And she gave you a baseball cap? Why?"

"I'll let you guess, Percy." I put the cap on and watched with a huge grin as Percy looked around wildly for me and his face morphed into an expression of pure shock. I took the cap off and started to laugh at his bewildered look. It was just too good an opportunity to miss. "It turns the wearer invisible," I explained through my laughter. "How's that for a magical item?"

He got that outraged look on his face. "I still say my magical item is better than yours."

"Is not!"

"Is too!"

"Ah, raised voices," Grover said as he walked up to us with his own backpack slung over his shoulder. He noticed the pen that Percy was holding and the hat that I was holding and frowned. "What are you guys doing? Signing hats for people?"

"In your dreams." I grumbled as I imagined the idiot girl who would want _Percy_ to sign their hat.

"It's my sword, Grover." Percy explained. "And the hat that Annabeth got from her... mom." The word was forced out and he turned green afterwards. I didn't want him to say that whether it was true or not. I was always going to be Percy's twin sister and that was it.

"Wait," Grover looked at me with wide eyes. "She visited you? Inside the cabin?"

I nodded. "Yeah, we packed together and ate breakfast and then watched this documentary thing." I didn't go into any details about that for reasons that would damage my reputation. There was no need for Percy to have any ammunition for use in name callings or arguments.

Grover mouth hung open. "You... like... like a real family would?"

I frowned. "I guess so. Why does that matter?"

"Well, it's just... I don't know if you realized Annabeth but not a lot of the people here have very good relationships with their godly parents. They rarely ever see them. And their mortal families are in constant danger around them so for you to be so close to your mother might be considered unfair by most of them. Probably all of them."

"It was just packing, breakfast and TV Grover," I said. "And if I hadn't been arguing with the goddess of wisdom then I might have actually managed to get out of some of that stuff."

"Chiron won't be happy," Grover mumbled. "We knew your mother would be attached to you but... this is really surprising. Maybe we should postpone our quest for a few minutes so I can tell him."

"No!" Me and Percy protested at the same time.

"Look, Grover, I know you're worried about this thing and I am too but we have to get moving," Percy said. "We have to get the master bolt back to Zeus and we only have ten days to do it. Let's get going."

"But... I... Its..." There was nothing that Grover could do to change our minds and that was mainly because we both wanted to get our mother out of the underworld as quickly as possible.

We walked up half-blood hill and me and Percy put our magical items back into our pockets. Neither of us could resist a good, "Mine's still better" every few seconds and it often led to a few shoulder shoves that Grover didn't notice as he led us up the hill. When we got to the top we saw a white van at the bottom of the hill labelled, 'Delphi Strawberry Co.' and I frowned. This was the sort of van that looked like it had no earthly business being there and was obviously up to something. I wondered if this was going to be a problem for any quests in the future but then remembered that the mist probably had something to do with it. We'd been taught about the mist in one of our activities although I was pretty certain that Percy had forgotten all about it by now.

Grover led us right up to the van and we all climbed inside the back. Now if you were walking along and saw three kids getting into the back of a white van that had no business being where it was you'd probably think the worst so I was very happy that there were no other people about to see us. Once we'd got inside and sat down Grover banged three times on the thin wall that separated the back of the van from the front. The van started up and began to move rather quickly which almost sent Percy into me but I managed to stop him from causing any damage. I decided that the safest option was for him to sit on the opposite side of the van and so gave him a good shove to make sure he was sat there instead.

"Argus will drop us off once we get to the inner city," Grover explained although he looked really nervous. "Then we're on our own."

"Sounds like fun," Percy muttered sarcastically. "How are we going to get to the underworld from inner city New York?"

"We could always take a bus," I suggested. "They're really cheap and can go anywhere in the states. That was we won't be wasting much time and can save money."

"I like the bus idea," Grover agreed. "Buses are safe. Full of people. Friendly mortal people."

I rolled my eyes at that. We could see parts of what was outside through the window in the front and it didn't seem real to me any more. The kids going about in their hoodies and laughing at jokes that other people were oblivious to. It reminded me of the days when me and Percy had used to go around on the street for long walks which often involved annoying some person we didn't know and then we'd run all the way home to avoid being beaten up or worse. You might think that it was stupid but we were kids and to a kid there was no such thing as a stupid idea. Ideas that you probably shouldn't use but definitely not stupid ones.

After spending time in Camp Half-Blood I found myself staring at every car that drove by, every person who wasn't carrying a sword, every little kid who wasn't being pursued by monsters or playing in deadly games such as Capture the flag. Argus, the guy who was driving and had about a thousand eyes on his body, didn't speak as he took us into the city but I knew that he was watching. How could he not? I spotted a familiar looking lamppost that I had used to hang around with Percy in our holidays so that we could have fun messing around and doing lots of stupid stuff. We usually stood there for a good few hours and laughed about things we'd seen or done. I couldn't help but wonder if we could ever be like that again. Just the normal brother and sister we were meant to be.

Argus stopped the van at Greyhound station on the Upper East Side and we all got out. Me and Percy were moving around a lot because we were really close to our mom and Smelly Gabe's apartment. I stopped dead in my tracks when I saw what was taped to a mailbox just in front of us. A soggy sheet of paper with mine and Percy's pictures on it and big bold writing saying, 'HAVE YOU SEEN THESE CHILDREN?'. I tore it down without a second thought and showed it to Percy. The contact number wasn't one that either of us knew which meant it had to be Gabe's. We didn't bother to learn anything about him and we knew our mom's number by heart.

He snatched it from my hand and threw it in the nearest trash can with the 'we'll talk later' look. Argus handed us our bus tickets, which we had been given before even though we were debating how best to travel, and unloaded the extra bags that Percy and Grover had brought. I'd only taken one since I _had_ been packing it with the goddess of wisdom and battle strategy in the room with me. He drove away with a few of his eyes watching us as he pulled out of the parking lot. I turned to look in the direction of my mom's apartment and couldn't help but wonder what might be going on now. Probably a poker game over whether or not we were all dead at Smelly Gabe's request. My fists clenched at the thought and I vowed to kick that slime ball out of our home no matter what.

"Do you want to know why she married him?" Grover asked suddenly and me and Percy looked at him with identical frowns.

"She?" I asked.

"Your mom," Grover said and I didn't notice how the thunder didn't clap in the distance this time around. "Do you want to know why she married Gabe?"

I didn't even need to think about it. "Yes."

"It was to keep you safe," He answered. "The both of you. I'm not sure whether she married him before or after you arrived, Annabeth, but his smell was disgusting enough to hide the both of you for all this time. I can even smell it on you now when you've been away from him for so long. Only traces of it but there's much less on you Annabeth because you went into Cabin 7# and now I can smell the scent of your real mother instead."

"Won't that get us noticed?" I asked.

"By monsters? Yep. They'll notice alright but not in the way you think. The scent of a god when it's more than just a half-blood scent if like a big warning sign. It says to stay back unless you want to get killed in a terribly painful way and it doesn't just say that to monsters. Even I'm feeling a little uncomfortable right now."

"Oh," I said lamely. "Sorry Grover."

"It's okay. Occupational hazard and all that."

"Shouldn't we get going?" Percy suggested looking really anxious. "Quests to do, monsters to kill."

I knew that he wasn't really interested in completing this quest. I wouldn't have been either if it didn't mean that I'd never see my brother again. We just cared about getting our mom back and doing all that it took to make sure she got out of the underworld. She'd given her life to save us both and we were fully prepared to give ours right back. I could only imagine how Percy must be feeling. You see, I got claimed by my mother because she had wanted to do it ever since the moment she figured out where and who I was. You know the story behind that. Percy got claimed by his dad Poseidon because he needed a job done. And that job involved retrieving Zeus' lightning bolt from Hades and stopping a war from breaking out.

The rain that had started a while ago began to pick up a bit of speed and we got bored of waiting at the bus stop. Grover took one of the apples out of his bag and we got into a game of Hacky Sack. I kicked butt. Obviously. I managed to bounce it off my ankle and slam it into Percy's face three times whilst only getting hit myself twice. Then Percy hit it a little too high and the next thing you know it was Grover's morning snack. He turned a brilliant shade of crimson and tried to apologize but when me and Percy start laughing there isn't really much a person can do to snap us out of it. I had to stop Percy from falling off of his seat more than once.

Then the bus arrived and we all lined up for boarding with the other passengers. Grover started to sniff the air like he did whenever he could smell one of his favourite foods and shifted around a bit. Percy asked him about it but Grover just passed it off as 'probably nothing'. I didn't believe it for a second but there wasn't really much I could say to change the mind of a person like Grover once he got all jumpy so I decided to just keep my mouth shut for now. We stored our bags in the overhead area and sat down on one of the three seat spaces to the right of the bus. Me and Percy started up a quiet conversation of our plans for the quest until I looked up and froze. There were still people coming onto the bus and you won't believe who one of them was.

"Percy," I whispered urgently. "It's _her_. It's Mrs. Dodds."

He looked to the front of the bus and went as pale as I was. I'd thought that we wouldn't be seeing _that_ particular monster for a long while but here she was boarding the bus with two other ladies behind her. One wore a green hat. One wore a purple hat. But other than that they were identical. I had used to have nightmares about there being identical people who were just like demon teachers when I was little and now here they were. Triplet demon teachers who were otherwise known as Furies. I shrunk down as far as I could in my seat whilst still watching them. The two others crossed their legs in the isle like you'd imagine a person to do whilst relaxing but this was not relaxing. It was a clear sign that nobody leaves.

"This is bad," Grover mumbled. "All three of them at once. _Di immortales_. Oh no. Oh no."

"Okay," I said as I tried to stay calm. "Okay. There's got to be a way out of this. Uh... jump out the windows?"

"They don't open." Grover moaned.

"Emergency escape hatch?"

"There isn't one."

"What? It's a clearly written law that every vehicle needs to have a way out that isn't in the front in the event of an accident or -"

"_Annabeth_," Percy hissed. "This is not the time for your lectures. We're about to be turned into _mush_ by three old bats in hats and your only priority seems to be to tell Grover the laws of New York. Just get _on_ with the planning thing, yeah?"

I sighed. "Fine, fine." I thought for a second. "What about if you take my cap? It'll make you invisible and then maybe they won't come after us. I mean, the scent of a child of the Big Three is supposed to be more powerful than other smells right?"

"But you have a more powerful scent," Grover mumbled nervously. "More powerful than Percy's. It's the scent of your mom mixed with your half-blood scent mixed with Gabe's odour and mixed with the blessing of Poseidon from being a fully accepted member of his mortal family. Normally Gabe's smell would dampen those things but now you are the easiest thing in the world to smell. I could do it from half a mile away."

I cursed under my breath. "Damn it," I said. "Okay... there's got to be another option. Definitely another one."

"And what would that be?" Percy asked. "Because we're heading into a tunnel and there won't be any light left to see with. They could rip our faces off in seconds."

"Not Annabeth's unless they want to spend eternity being tortured by Athena," Grover added.

"Will you please just let me _think_?" I asked. "No more mentioning of that. Percy's not very good at being optimistic and he doesn't need any more help being _him_. I have a plan. Get your lightest bag and stay low."

When the bus entered the tunnel that was up ahead everything went dark. The only light was from the safety ones in the isles and Mrs. Dodds and her two ugly twins were on the move. I'm not entirely sure if monsters do this on a regular basis but they all proudly announced to the whole bus that they needed to use the restroom and started stalking towards us. I told Grover to stay in the exact spot he'd been before and got Percy to move to the opposite side of the bus. I was on my own crouched further back in the bus and making sure that the Furies could definitely find me first. If what Grover had said was true then I was going to be overpowering their scents by miles and that meant that they could sneak off the bus and then I could follow them with my invisibility cap.

The Furies didn't even stop in the row that Grover and Percy were in. They zeroed in on me like they had sonar radars in their brains and when Percy and Grover made a dash for the front of the bus they didn't notice. They were looking right at me and I knew they could see me. There was only one thing that really confused me. They didn't have menacing looks on their faces and instead had cautious and concentrated ones. Like if they made one mistake their entire existence would be doomed. From the front of the bus Percy gestured wildly for me to follow him and Grover out of the bus but I was frozen in place. Curiosity was what always got me and I really wanted to know why they weren't just attacking me.

"Child," Mrs. Dodds said in what might have been a kind voice. "Innocent child. You wouldn't want Lady Athena to butcher us now would you?"

I didn't even answer. If I had my answer would have been something like 'hell yes I would' but I was still frozen to the spot.

"Now if you would just tell us where the boy went and we'll be on our way," Her twin in the green hat added in the same voice. "Provoking the goddess of wisdom's wrath is not what any of us would want to happen. Tell us where it is and we'll be on our way."

"It?" I asked. "You mean... you think that we have the bolt?"

They all nodded.

"Well we don't." I said firmly. "You'd better go look somewhere else, preferably where you came from."

They lost their patience then, even if they had any to begin with, and snarled at me. I thought they were going to lunge but just as they were about to they hissed and stumbled back a few steps. I had no idea what was going on but they were changing out of their human disguises so I took my chances. I ran right past them and towards Percy and Grover. Grover had his mouth hanging open like he'd just seen the most amazing thing in the world and it scared him to death and Percy was just waiting for me so that we could get off of the bus. Then I heard screeches behind me from both the Furies and mortals alike. When I turned around I cringed at what I saw.

All three Furies with their leathery wings and hideous forms where flapping about in what looked like pain and distress. Then they all soared straight at us and we hit the deck just as they sailed over our heads and straight into the driver. I couldn't see what happened but I could definitely see what was happening on the road. We swerved out of the tunnel and caused cars to veer to the side to avoid us. There was an unreal amount of flapping about going on in the drivers seat because of the Furies and before long we'd taken a hair-raising turn onto one of those 'I can't believe it's here' roads. There was a woods to our left, a river to our right and a long stretch of road in front of us.

Percy got out his pen and uncapped it. Riptide sprung forth and I wasn't sure why he did it but he thought it was a good idea to slash at the Furies. They hissed and extracted themselves from the box where the driver sat to bare their yellow fangs at Percy and Grover. I was left unnoticed for some reason... well, not unnoticed but definitely unattacked or threatened. I had no idea why but I moved into a defensive position just in case.

"Perseus Jackson," Mrs. Dodds hissed and she took a long fiery whip from out of what could have been thin air. Her evil twins did the same. "You do not have the same rights as the missing child of Athena. Hand over the bolt and you will not suffer eternal punishment."

Percy clenched his jaw and swung his sword at them again. "I liked you better as a maths teacher." He stated.

"You will be destroyed, Perseus Jackson!" Mrs. Dodds declared. "Zeus will burn your ashes and Hades will have your soul!"

Thunder rumbled above us and I heard my real mother's voice shouting in my head '_Get out of the bus! Get out now!_' I really didn't need the encouragement and I opened the bus doors with a little effort to get to the controls which the Furies were dangerously close to. I grabbed Percy and Grover and threw us all out of the bus so that we landed in a heap on the grassy floor just off of the road. There was a loud _BOOM! _and the bus windows exploded outwards with all of the passengers either yelling or screaming in terror. I saw the flash of a camera in Percy's direction but thought nothing off it. My ears were ringing and the bus in front of us was a smouldering wreck of heated metal with a large crater in the roof.

There was a loud screeching noise from inside which let me know that Mrs. Dodds hadn't met a fiery death in the bus like she should have. Grover shrieked girlishly and jumped to his feet.

"We have to go!" He yelled. "She's calling for reinforcements! Move! Move! Move!"

Me and Percy jumped up to our feet and we all plunged into the woods. We left behind us a wreckage of a bus, the angriest monsters I had ever seen and a lot of questions that were best saved for later. Why hadn't the Furies just attacked me outright? And why did I suddenly feel like there was a bubble around me that could keep out any and all monsters?


	12. We Meet A Woman With Pet Snakes

**Hidden Away**

**Disclaimer: I own nothing, all credit goes to the owner/creator of Percy Jackson. **

**Summary: Cursed so that Athena can never sense her, Annabeth is constantly attacked by monsters. At age three she was found in an alleyway by Sally Jackson and grew up as Percy's 'twin' sister. When the lighting bolt is stolen Athena slowly begins to ****realize**** that the demi-god helping Jackson is actually her own daughter. **

_**We Meet A Woman With Pet Snakes, Percy Jackson**_

You know, it's a good thing to know about the Greek gods. Then you know that there is someone to blame for all of the bad things happening to you. For instance, if you're running away from three triplet demon Furies with a bus on fire behind you and then it starts pouring with rain you just know that someone up there has it in for you. I couldn't really understand it since Annabeth was supposed to be her mom's favourite kid and none of this bad stuff should be happening with her around but I guessed that Athena didn't have much influence over the weather. I knew that there were some spots on us that were so muddy the dirt would never wash off.

We ran through the woods until we were sure that we had left the bus and the three demon Furies far behind us. When we finally came to a stop Grover collapsed under the weight of his bag and me and Annabeth keeled over and took shallow breaths. That had been a seriously close call and Grover looked ready to pass out from shock and fright alone. Once we'd evened out our breathing and managed to stand up straight without feeling any protesting pain in our lungs or back, we looked around at the area we were standing in. There wasn't a shred of civilization in sight and I knew we were in big trouble. We only had what was in our backpacks for help.

"Great," I said. "Now where do we go?"

"You're asking me?" Annabeth replied. "I'm not the one they were looking for on the bus. And it wasn't even one of us they were looking for. It was a thing."

"The bolt," Grover said from his position on the floor. "Zeus' master bolt. They thought that we had it or at least knew where it was."

"But why?" I asked. "Why would they think that we knew where the bolt was? That's the whole reason we're on this quest! And why didn't they attack Annabeth?"

"Smell," Grover mumbled.

"Hey! I don't smell that bad." Annabeth protested.

"No, no. Not like that. It's like I said before, you have the scent of Athena on you. It is like a big beacon to monsters that says 'here I am!' but it also says that if they so much as touch you they will burn in eternal flames curtesy of Athena herself. The Kindly Ones may be ugly hags but they're smart and they serve Hades. As soon as they get back to him with their reports them he'll know who you are, Annabeth, and he'll also know to steer clear of you because it's plainly obvious that you had nothing to do with the theft of the master bolt. No gods could sense you so it's pointless to accuse you when there's a perfectly good suspect already." He gestured to Percy.

I sighed in exasperation. "I _didn't_ steal the lightning bolt! What do I have to do to convince them of that?"

"Exactly what we have been doing, Percy. Making our way to the underworld and getting the bolt back ourselves so that you can present it to the god of the sky and stop a war before it's even begun." Grover said. "It shouldn't be too hard considering..."

"Considering what?"

"Considering that no monsters are going to dare to come near Annabeth," Grover replied. "We stick close to her and we're safe from any monsters that aren't as aggressive or bold as The Kindly Ones. That rules out about three quarters of the monsters in New York all at once."

"That's good," I said with relief. "No monsters to fight and no delays."

"I didn't say _no_ monsters, Percy." Grover reminded me. "I said that only the aggressive and bold ones would attack us. And they will find us really easily with the smell you two are giving off."

"Wonderful," Annabeth said sarcastically. "Now there's no way for us to stay off the radar."

"Which direction should we go in?" I asked her.

"I'm not all that sure by my gut says to go that way," She pointed to a spot to our left. "We should move quickly instead of mourning over the loss of two of five bags." Here she looked pointedly at Grover.

"Tin cans..." He moaned. "A perfectly good bag stuffed with tin cans..."

We chose to ignore him and took off in the direction that Annabeth had suggested. It was difficult to navigate left with all of the trees and bushes that made us change direction but in the end we came out in a clearing that was more to the right than to the left. That basically meant that we'd been forced in an entirely different direction and I was immediately cautious. Annabeth is brilliant at choosing safe routes which means that you do not want to end up going in the opposite direction. If you do, you end up in mortal danger that I didn't really think much of when we were younger but now I was very worried. That is, until I saw where we came out at and smelt what came from it.

It smelt of hamburgers and fries and everything that came from your typical fast food place. Right then I didn't want to go in the direction that Annabeth wanted anymore. I wanted to stay right where I was, possibly go inside the place that smelt so great and forget all about the quest that we had to do. Grover started sniffing like crazy and got this dreamy look over his face. Grover and I had left our bags that had all of our food in them since they weren't deemed 'necessary' when there were three Furies bearing down on us but right now they seemed like the things we should have taken instead of bags of clothes and maps and money.

"Aunty Em's Garden Gnome Emporium," Grover translated from the sign. "Sounds sweet."

Annabeth looked a little uncomfortable. "We should keep moving," She said. "Stopping now wouldn't be a very good idea."

"But they must have food inside," I protested. "And we're hungry. We left our food back on the bus and you didn't bring enough for all three of us."

"Percy, we only have ten days to get the bolt." She reminded me.

I was past the point of listening. My sister was smart and all but I was one hundred percent certain that I made better decisions than she did. It was the whole sibling rivalry thing that clouded my senses and started arguments between us that could last for whole years if we were lucky. Besides, I wasn't in the mood for my sister right now. The place smelt of a fast food restaurant and this boy needed a pack of fries to go. It looked like there had used to be a lot of traffic going through here before the highway was built because an old and cracked road went right across the field in front of Aunty Em's Garden Gnome Emporium. Just as we were about to start crossing said road, Annabeth stopped and rubbed her temples like she had a headache or something.

"Hey," I said in concern. "Are you okay?"

Food now forgotten, I started to check her over for injuries. The problem was I couldn't find any. That was another thing about my personality. It could go from food taking priority to Annabeth taking priority and then go right back again. You can probably guess why we were treated differently by the other kids at the boarding schools we'd been to. Well, I guess you could just put that down to the fact that we were half-bloods but that only added to how differently we were treated. Annabeth let out a long breath to stop herself from showing any signs of pain but I could read her like a book when her guard was down. I was starting to get worried.

"What is it?" I asked. "I know somethings up."

"No, it's just..." Annabeth opened her eyes and sighed. She looked paler than before. "You remember what happened in second grade when I got really, really nervous?"

"You mean right before I fell off the stage into the guy who was going to play Romeo?" I asked.

Annabeth nodded with a slight smile. "Yeah, that." She said. "Well it's happening again."

I made a point of cringing. You see, our second grade didn't go very well. We moved to about four different schools in the course of that one year and the worst school we went to was called National Woods Academy. It's one of those really run down academy's where you just can't see how it stays open. Anyway, me and Annabeth had been forced into one of these Shakespearian plays even though we both hated the things and Annabeth was going to do a spelling bee and worldwide competition right after it. That was too much for her and she got so nervous that when we were on stage her stomach made this weird noise before she ran off and threw up eight times without stopping. It was awful. To make matters worse, when I tried to get to her I slipped on some of it and fell into the Romeo guy. I told them all that it was my fault and we got kicked out of the school for 'endangering students' although I still think that it was their fault for making an eight year old do all of those things at once.

"Okay..." I said slowly. "Okay. We ditch your plan and look around for something to eat. That way you won't throw up all over us and you can calm your nerves."

Annabeth nodded. "Good idea." She agreed.

Then we crossed the deserted road. It had two lanes. One for cars going one way and the other for the exact same but reversed. The building was on the other side of said road and looked like one of those run down old gas stations with a warehouse attached to it. Only the warehouse had wooden items, gnomes and stone statues outside. It was mostly stone statues and they all had a different expression on their faces along with the best detail I'd ever seen. Some looked happy, some looked like they were confused and some, which confused me, looked like they were in mortal danger and scared out of their wits.

The lights were on inside so I guessed that it was open and there were two ugly looking gnomes outside the front door. As we moved closer Grover started to get all nervous and he moved from one hoof to the other a lot. I would have said that he was like Annabeth but her problems were caused by a very severe stomach ache so I decided that it was best to just ignore him and get my sister something to stop her from vomiting. If I'd smelt good food before then now I was smelling delicious food. There were statues everywhere in the front garden and Grover kept sniffing the air in that nervous way of his.

"Do you smell that?" Grover asked nervously.

"Yeah," I agreed. "Snack bar."

"What? No! I meant monsters. I smell monsters."

I looked at Annabeth. "Snack bar?"

"Snack bar." She agreed.

"Are you guys insane?" Grover asked. "I smell monsters! Bad ones!"

"You said yourself that no monster worth half of the furies is going to come after us," Annabeth reminded him. "Your nose is clogged up."

"And don't you want to eat? I smell burgers." I added.

"Burgers? Yuck!" He said disgustedly. "Meat! Terrible food choices! I'm a vegetarian."

"Do cheese enchiladas and aluminum cans count as vegetarian food?"

"Those are vegetables," Grover insisted. "Let's go. I don't like this place. The statues are watching me."

But we didn't leave as right at that moment the front door creaked open and standing in the doorway was a tall woman from the Middle East. Well, I assumed that she was from the Middle East. I'd seen enough documentaries, thanks to Annabeth, and this woman was dressed in black from head to toe leaving only her hands exposed. Just like a Middle Eastern woman did. There was a veil covering her entire face though her eyes glinted behind it and her hands were old but well cared for. I imagined that she must be a grandmother although I hadn't seen that many in my life.

"Hello children," She said in what was definitely a Middle Eastern accent. "It is too late to be out. Where are your parents?"

"They... uh..." Annabeth started to say. "Had to..."

"We're orphans," I said before she could say anything else. Besides, it was actually true in a way for her. Our mother was dead, her godly mother didn't exactly count and gods only knew what had happened to her father (whoever he was).

"You're orphans?" The woman said and she spoke it in such a way that it was one of those words she didn't really say that often. "Surely not! My dears you must be so depressed."

Annabeth glanced at me with one of those meaningful looks that either meant 'keep going' or 'I'm going to hurl'. I decided to hurry up and get us somewhere where she wouldn't vomit.

"No, our circus friends help us to get through it. We were supposed to meet our ringmaster at the gas station if we got lost but I guess he must have forgotten or meant another gas station." I continued to lie.

"Oh dear," The woman said in sympathy. "Then come in! Come in! You children must get out of the cold and the rain. My name is Aunty Em. Go straight to the back, if you please. There is a dining area."

We said our thanks, me and Annabeth more than Grover, and walked to the back of the warehouse as instructed. As we walked Annabeth moved closer to me.

"Circus friends?" She said. "That's got to be the best story you've ever come up with."

I smirked. "Thanks, Annabeth."

There were statues inside too and each had a different expression or pose. I didn't see how a person could have a garden big enough for even one of the statues since they were all life size copies but I'd never had a garden before so I guessed that when you actually did have one they were pretty big. We got to the back of the warehouse and saw the dining area that Aunty Em had mentioned. Now, by this point I was thinking more about food and not getting vomited on more than anything else so I wasn't really focusing on anything else. We all completely missed the way that Aunty Em tried to walk behind us but stopped in her tracks and hissed a little when she got too close to Annabeth. We also missed the way that she locked the door behind us.

The dining area was more than I could have hoped it to be. There was a fast food counter with a grill that smelt delicious, a soda fountain, pretzel heater and even a nacho cheese dispenser. I could imagine this becoming mine and Annabeth's new hang out spot for when we got kicked out of the apartment by Smelly Gabe and his crew. Our last one consisted of a lamp post and ventilation shaft that made us warmer when it was in the cold of winter. There were also some steel picnic tables out front in case there was an overflow of people but since it was just me, Annabeth and a nervous Grover I didn't really pay attention to them.

"Uh, we don't have any money, miss." Grover said before either of us could stop him.

"No need to worry, children. This is a special case for such special little orphans." Aunty Em said.

"Thank you, ma'am." Annabeth spoke and I was slightly shocked by that. I'd never heard her speak nicely to a person in front of me unless I was sad, injured or had just had a really bad day. The joys of having a twin.

Aunty Em went so still she could have been a statue but none of us noticed since we were still eyeing the snack bar. She shook herself out of her frozen state and relaxed once more. It was so quick that she might not have frozen at all.

"It's nothing, Annabeth." She said. "You have such beautiful eyes, child."

I didn't even bother to wonder how Aunty Em knew Annabeth's name since we'd never introduced ourselves. I just agreed with Aunty Em on the subject. Annabeth did have nice eyes that were grey and could go from stormy to calm in half a second whilst never once losing their powerful effect. None of the kids in the Athena cabin had those sort of eyes although they did have eyes that were similar. I guessed that Annabeth must have inherited her mother's eyes completely since Chiron had told me that Athena had stormy grey eyes and her children had similar ones. He also said that he'd never seen a pair of eyes that matched Athena's so well until Annabeth arrived at camp and this was before we even knew about Annabeth's parentage.

Aunty Em disappeared behind the snack bar and started cooking whilst we all sat down at one of the metal picnic tables. In what seemed like a minute later she returned with plastic trays full of double cheeseburgers, vanilla shakes and XXL servings of the best French fries I'd ever smelt. She put one down in front of each of us and we still didn't notice how smoke started to rise off of her arm as it got too close to Annabeth. She then moved away at what might have been super human speed and looked at her now smoking limb with a sneer that was hidden behind her black veil.

I attacked my cheese burgers without breathing and when I remembered to I inhaled what was left of my burger and moved onto the next one. Annabeth slurped on her vanilla shake and munched on French fries that weren't as good as the blue ones our mom would make but they were still fairly tasty. Grover picked at his fries and eyed the wax paper like he would rather eat that instead. He was too nervous to eat anything. Now you may not know this but I have had an effect on Annabeth over the years. It changed the way she went about a lot of things, like the amount of time we spend fighting, but one really noticeable thing was our eating habits. In the course of two minutes I'd gone through half of my cheeseburgers and she'd downed her entire vanilla shake and attacked the XXL French fries servings enough to get them down to the amount you'd find in a large pack.

"Do you hear that?" Grover asked suddenly.

"Hear what?" I asked with a mouth full of cheese burger.

"That hissing noise."

I listened but couldn't hear anything. Annabeth just shook her head since it was very difficult to talk with a mouth full of French fries.

"Hissing?" Aunty Em asked. "Oh, perhaps you hear the fryer oil. You have very keen ears, Grover. A very special gift."

"I take vitamins for them," Grover mumbled in response.

"What an admirable trait, but please... relax and have something to eat."

Aunty Em didn't eat anything. Not a single thing. She didn't even take off her headdress and every time she ventured closer to the table she would instantly retreat as if taking any steps closer were like walking on hot coals. I was starting to get filled up after one more cheese burger so I slurped on my vanilla shake for a while before inhaling my food once again. Grover started to eat but it was very cautiously and his eyes kept darting about everywhere as if a monster could jump out from behind one of the statues and eat us. Annabeth finished her fries in record time and she looked much better than she had before. The stress of losing our mother, finding out she wasn't her real one and all of this half-blood quest stuff had really gotten to her and caused her trade mark reaction of vomiting but I'd managed to avoid it this time around.

"Feeling better, little sister?" I asked with a grin.

"I am _not_ your _little_ sister," Annabeth said whilst taking a cheese burger out of its wrapper. "But yes, I am feeling better."

"Sister?" Aunty Em asked. "You are related then?"

"Yes," I said offhandedly. "We're twins."

"Losing your parents must have been hard for the two of you."

"It was depressing but at least we had each other," I replied and Annabeth frowned at me. It was one of those 'say what?' looks and I knew that what I'd just said was extremely cheesy. "So, um... ma'am, you sell gnomes?" I said, trying to change the subject.

"Oh, yes," Aunty Em said. "And ornaments. Anything that can go in a persons garden I sell."

"Do you get a lot of business on this road?"

"Not so much now, no. Ever since the highway was built I've had to treasure every customer I get. "

Suddenly I felt a tingling sensation on the back of my neck and turned around to see a statue there. I found it odd since I usually got that feeling when there was someone watching me but statues didn't watch people. I noticed Annabeth eyeing my fries out of the corner of my eye and pushed them towards her in exchange for half of her cheese burgers. That was just one of the many times we'd swapped food over the years. I went back to looking at the statue. It was of a small girl holding an Easter basket with ribbons in her hair. It was like one of those things you saw in films they showed at Easter. There was one small thing wrong though. The girls face. She looked startled, terrified even.

"Ah, I see you have noticed the statue," Aunty Em said. "The face is always the hardest to get right. Always the face."

"You make all of these statues yourself?" I asked.

"Oh yes. A long time ago I used to have two sisters who helped me with business but they passed on. Faded away. Leaving me all alone."

Grover, who had been munching on his wax paper, stopped eating with a frown. "Two sisters?" He repeated. "I've heard that somewhere before..." He added quietly.

"It's a terrible story," Aunty Em said. "Not for the ears of children such as yourselves. You see, Grover, once upon a time a bad woman was jealous of me. I had a boyfriend, of sorts, and she was determined to break us apart no matter what. Because of this she caused a terrible accident to befall me and my sisters stayed by me. But they could not share my misfortune forever and they passed on. It is just me now. I alone have survived."

I didn't know what 'survived' meant but I did know that I was starting to get sleepy. Annabeth stifled a yawn behind her hand and I went tense thinking that she might vomit on me but relaxed again once she closed her mouth. I really did not want to be vomited on and that snapped me out of my tired daze. Our food was just about finished, if you didn't count Grover's tray, and something didn't feel right now that I wasn't feeling tired anymore.

"We should go," Grover said as he swallowed the wax paper. "The ringmaster is waiting. Remember?"

"Right," I agreed. "Annabeth, the ringmaster's waiting for us."

"Such lovely eyes," Aunty Em said. "Such beautiful grey eyes. I've never seen such a perfect match before. Never in all these years."

Something clicked in my brain as I made a connection. Chiron had said almost exactly the same thing about Annabeth's eyes. A perfect match to Athena's. Aunty Em hadn't said that but it was close enough for warning bells to go off in my mind. I stood up abruptly and pulled my sister up with me.

"We should go," I said. "The ringmaster will be worried about us."

"Yes!" Grover agreed whole-heartedly as he stood up too. "The ringmaster. We need to get back to him."

"Please, children," Aunty Em spoke. "I so rarely get to be with young ones. Let alone... twins." The word was forced out. It was obvious and Aunty Em made it sound like a complete lie. "Before you go, won't you at least sit for a pose?"

"A pose," Annabeth repeated warily. "You mean like a photograph?"

"Yes, exactly that." Aunty Em said. "I can use it to create an entirely new statue set. People always enjoy children sets in their gardens. The most popular models around."

I gave Annabeth a little shake to wake her up and she blinked several times. "I don't know, ma'am." She said. "We really do need to get going."

Grover and I spoke words of agreement.

"What's the harm in one little photograph?" Aunty Em asked with sadness in her voice. "Just one. Please?"

One. Well, that didn't sound so bad to me. Before we could say anything Aunty Em herded us out the front door and through the maze of statues in the front garden. This time I noticed how she didn't dare to push Annabeth or go within three inches of her. If I hadn't been holding onto my sisters arm then she would have been left inside the warehouse with the nacho cheese dispenser. Aunty Em directed us towards a park bench with a stone satyr standing beside it. I didn't see how this would be a very good thing to have in the photo and tightened my grip on Annabeth. There was something about this that didn't feel right.

"Now," Aunty Em said once she'd stopped. "We just have to get the positioning right. The young girl should be in the middle, I think. Her twin on the right hand side."

There was that word again. Twin. She had forced it out of her mouth in the most obvious way and it made me uncomfortable. We all moved about to get in the position that she'd wanted us to and I looked up at the now darkened sky.

"Not much light about," I remarked. "The photo won't be very good."

"Enough light to see each other," Aunty Em said. "Now, hush, hush. Everybody still and big smiles. The face is always the hardest to get right. Big smiles please."

Grover looked at the satyr beside the park bench. "That sure looks a lot like my Uncle Ferdinand." He mumbled.

"Grover, look this way, dear."

There was no camera in her hands. I got this feeling in my stomach that something was very, very wrong shifted about on the bench. Aunty Em seemed to think that we'd gotten into the perfect position and lifted her hands up to unwrap the wrap around her head. She told us to remain perfectly still but Grover kept looking at the satyr statue beside us with a nervous frown on his face. Then, just as Aunty Em was about to take the wrap off her head he shot up straight in his seat.

"That _is_ my Uncle Ferdinand!" He cried before shoving both me and Annabeth off the bench.

I could now only see Aunty Em's sandaled feet and Annabeth sprawled out on the floor beside me. Grover yanked her Yankee's baseball cap from her pocket and jammed it onto her head so that she disappeared in the next second. He then scrambled off to the left and yelled one word to me as he went.

"Medusa!"

From wherever her invisible self was, I heard Annabeth curse and scramble off in another direction which left me alone with a woman who I had heard a lot about in my old Latin class. I closed my eyes tight and turned away from her so that I could open them and rush away to hide behind a large statue of a man wearing a deerstalker hat and a trench coat. Aunty Em, I soon realized, was actually Medusa and that was probably why I could hear the sounds of tiny little snakes right at the area where her head had been. In front of me was a small pile of those clear glass spheres that people put in their gardens and I could see her face.

The headdress was gone which left her head clear for me to see in the reflection. Her face was a pale circle that looked like it hadn't seen the sun for quite some time and her hair was writhing like serpents. Her hair _was_ serpents. I could have kicked myself for being such an idiot and I knew that this was something I should have known. Total strangers do not invite three kids into a warehouse to give them free food unless they have an ulterior motive and it seems that 'Aunty Em's' was to turn us into statues. I recited the Greek myth in my head since it had been drilled there by Annabeth in our revision sessions. Medusa had been the boyfriend of Poseidon and Athena had turned her into a snake haired monster. That was all I could remember at that moment.

"The Grey-Eyed One did this to me, Perseus," Medusa said but she didn't sound a thing like a monster. "You cannot deceive me, I knew all along that you were not twins. My enemies child must be destroyed, Percy. She turned me from a beautiful woman into this."

"Don't listen to her Percy!" Annabeth shouted from somewhere in the maze of statues. "Just run!"

I probably should of but I didn't. I know what you're thinking. I probably stayed where I was because of the voice Medusa had and how it sounded like a grandmothers and enticed me to look at her face for real instead of her reflection. But, I have said this many times in my life and I will say it again for your benefit. Nobody, I repeat, _nobody_ says that Annabeth is not my twin. Not even a snake haired monster with talons for hands and wart infested skin.

"Annabeth is my twin you reptile mutated freak!" I shouted at Medusa in a blind rage that lasted for about a minute. "And not you or anyone else is going to change that!"

Medusa let out a roar of anger but it was nothing compared to my own. I really needed to take some anger management classes one day.

"Percy!" I heard Grover shout at me, accompanied by the sound of a large aero plane that was above to nose dive. "Duck!"

I turned my head to see Grover up in the sky with his flying shoes on. I may not have mentioned this before but whilst Annabeth was busy with the Athena cabin solving the whole of maths we got a gift from Luke. They were flying shoes that were activated by the Greek word _'maia' _and Grover seemed to be able to use them pretty well. His eyes were screwed shut and his head twitched from left to right. You know what that meant? My half-goat friend was flying and navigating with nothing but his ears and nose. I dove out of the way as fast as I possibly could and hoped that Grover wouldn't get turned to stone.

There was a loud _thwack!_ and Medusa howled with rage. Grover shouted something about 'that was for Uncle Ferdinand' and started dive bombing the monster with his eyes closed. I had to admit that it was pretty cool even when I could only see it in reflection. Grover picked up a tree branch and dove at Medusa once again with his eyes shut and managed to bosh her on the head with it. I stopped looking at the reflection in a glass sphere and looked around for something that could help me. A hiding place, a weapon made of stone or _anything_. I ended up getting something way better than an object.

"Percy," A voice said right beside me and I jumped ten feet in the air in surprise. The person took off their Yankee's baseball cap with a grin.

I'd gotten my overly intelligent twin sister.

"For the love of- don't _do_ that, Annabeth!" I said. "You could have killed me!"

She just rolled her eyes in response. "You have to cut her head off," She said.

"What?" I asked. "Are you insane? We should be getting out of here. Not sticking around to chop off the head of an old hag with snakes for hair."

"Percy, Medusa is a menace. She's pure evil. I'd kill her myself but you heard what she said. I'll be sliced into a million pieces before I can even get close to her," Annabeth said before pointing to a nearby statue of a couple hugging one another. "Do you want any more innocent people to end up like that?"

I took one look at the statue and decided I didn't.

Annabeth picked up a glass sphere like the one's I'd been able to see Medusa's reflection in except this one was tinged green. She studied it with a critical eye and her geeky face came on. I know that we were being attacked by a monster and Grover was risking his life behind us but I couldn't help but let out an exasperated groan right then. My sister had gone into geek mode. Again. She said all of these facts about the 'convection' and 'size of the reflection' before I was able to get her to stop talking. Honestly, it's like she forgot we were going to get killed and started a lecture for the really smart kids you found in colleges and I was not one of those kids.

"Alright, alright," I said as I snatched the ball from her. "I'll chop her head off. Just stop lecturing me."

She stuck her tongue out at me and then disappeared again thanks to her Yankee's baseball cap. I vowed never to let her give me a lecture when there was a monster attacking us again. Grover came in for another pass with the now broken tree branch but flew a little too low. The next thing you knew he had been thrown right into the arms of a stone grizzly bear and was dazed. Medusa advanced on him but I came out from my hiding place whilst carefully watching her with the green tinted glass ball.

I yelled, "Hey!" and she whipped around to look at me with an evil snarl on her face that became one of those evil smiles that a person gives you when they hate you but want to do something for their own amusement.

"You wouldn't hurt a poor old woman, Percy." Medusa said and she sounded so sure of herself. "I know that you wouldn't."

I continued to move towards her. She let me get close and I guess I should have been grateful since I would have had a hard time defending myself. I got within ten metres, five metres... then she cackled and I realized for the first time just how ugly her face was. I mean, it was just _horrible_. I hoped that the green glass was distorting the image since something that hideous simply couldn't exist. Maybe all of Annabeth's geek speak about the glass meant something. I was regretting not listening to her now.

"Percy!" Grover shouted from the cement bear. "Don't listen to her!"

Medusa snarled. "Too late."

That's when she lunged at me with her talons and I sliced upwards blindly with my sword. There was the sound of _shlock! _and I felt like wretching just from hearing it. It was worse than seeing her face in the glass ball. There was the sound of wind rushing quickly through a gap or hole and I knew the monster was disintegrating. Something fell to the ground beside my foot and I felt warm, gooey liquid seeping into my sock. Tiny snake heads tugged at my shoelaces and I realized that it was the head. Oh, how much I wanted to vomit right then. It took everything in me not to look down or kick the thing away.

"Ugh," Grover said with disgust. "That is just... yuck. Mega-super-ultra-yuck."

Annabeth appeared next to me with her eyes trained on the sky. She looked like she would rather be in another country right now and she was holding Medusa's black veil in her hands.

"Don't move." She said.

Carefully, and with her eyes trained on anything but the monsters head, she knelt and draped the object in the black cloth before picking it up. Green juice dripped out from the bottom and we could all look at it now since the head was hidden in the veil.

"You okay?" Annabeth asked me.

"I'm fine," I replied. "You?"

"Never better." She said sarcastically.

"Why didn't the head evaporate?" I asked.

"Not sure. Maybe for the same reason as the Minotaur horn but we never learned why that was."

Grover moaned and mumbled about stupid monsters as he climbed down from the grizzly bear statue where he had been thrown by Medusa. There was a big welt on his forehead that let me know which body part had collided with the statue first and his green rasta cap was hanging off one of his little goat horns. The flying sneakers were flapping about in the air around his head like the stars you saw in cartoons that showed how a person was dazed or confused. Annabeth frowned at them and I knew that I should have told her about the flying sneakers ages ago but I decided to let her ask me instead of me just answering her unspoken question.

"Grover," I said with a smile. "That was great flying, man."

He gave me a lopsided grin. "That was one of the _least_ funnest things I have ever done, Percy. Well, the hitting her on the head with a stick thing? That was fun. The colliding with a stone statue and getting my head bashed? That was not fun. Not fun at all." He snatched the shoes out of the air and stuffed them back on, along with his fake feet.

"What the heck are those?" Annabeth asked.

"Flying shoes," I said. "Luke gave them to us."

"And this just suddenly escaped your mind."

"Yes."

We took the head, which I managed to persuade Annabeth to keep holding, into the warehouse and set it down on the table where we had eaten. I found some old plastic grocery bags and gave them to Annabeth so that she could doubly wrap the head in them for more safety. Then this really strange thing happened. Her hand brushed against the head through the fabric and she got this disgusted look on her face but then smoke started to rise from the area and I pulled her away quickly. The bags were securely wrapped around Medusa's head but there was smoke rising from the section where Annabeth had touched it. I checked her hand but it was fine.

"What was that?" I asked.

"Oh..." Grover looked really uncomfortable. "I guess there is such a thing as being too overprotective..."

"Grover," Annabeth said. "What do you know?"

"Well, um... it might be because of the blessing of Poseidon and Athena on you _or_, the more likely option, Lady Athena was watching and saw that we were heading towards Medusa's lair so she made it so that if Medusa came close enough to you she would start to disintegrate. It's supposed to be one of those things that hasn't been done in a long while." Grover explained.

"That explains why she wouldn't touch you," I said as I remembered when Medusa had been herding us out of the door. "She must have figured it out the hard way."

Annabeth sighed. "Great, so you could have just thrown me at her and she'd be dead."

We sat around the head and watched as the smoke slowly faded and a small part of the bag sagged as part of the head disappeared. I wondered if this was going to become a regular occurrence when Annabeth's mom thought that there was a monster we couldn't handle.

"So," I said after a few minutes. "We have Athena to thank for this monster? Right?"

Even though Annabeth had only known about the goddess being her biological mother for a day, she gave me an irritated look.

"No, Percy. Just think about the story," She told me. I gave her my dumb look and she sighed. "You don't remember do you? I told you to remember it. Medusa was Poseidon's girlfriend and they arranged to meet in Athena's temple which was extremely offensive. Medusa and her two sisters, who helped her get into the temple, were turned into Gorgons as punishment."

"Okay," I said slowly. "So it is the gods fault."

"Percy," Grover warned with a nervous glance at the ceiling. "You're not exactly in the best of places to be insulting the gods right now. Let's just not talk about whose fault it is."

"Right," I said with a clenched jaw.

I'd had just about enough of the gods getting in the way of things and I was ready to burst from frustration. First we'd got blasted off the road by the gods. Attacked by all three furies at once. And now we ended up in the lair of Medusa who wanted to destroy Annabeth but wasn't able to because her mother had protected her but not bothered with us. I stood up from the table and went into the very back of the warehouse to look around, ignoring Annabeth as she called after me.

I searched around for the locations that Medusa had delivered items to. Her recent sales list showed that there had been several deliveries made to the Underworld and the address was listed on all of the bills. I chose one and stuffed it into my pocket. There were several golden drachmas and twenty bucks in the till which I 'borrowed' since it wasn't like Medusa was going to call the cops on me or anything. Then I found a delivery box that was just big enough for Medusa's head to go in and got an idea. I picked it up and walked back to Annabeth and Grover and dropped the box on the table.

Making sure that it didn't go too close to Annabeth, I picked up the head and dropped it in the box. With a few words and a Hermes delivery stamp I had sent the head to Olympus. That was enough to make me feel a little better than before.

"That was dangerous, Percy." Grover warned.

"Yeah," Annabeth agreed. "And yet I really think it was the best thing to do. Who wants to carry a head around with them?"

I smiled. "Definitely not me."


End file.
